I live in Minnesota, where the weather is always doing…the most.
As I write this, we are on our fourth cloudy day in a row. I checked the forecast again, hoping that perhaps the sun had changed its mind and decided to make an appearance.
Nope.
Clouds today.
Clouds tomorrow.
Clouds after that.
And so begins that familiar Minnesota season when “sunny and cool” slowly gives way to “cloudy and chilly,” and we start realizing just how much we miss the sun when we cannot see it.
We need light.
Our bodies know it.
Our moods know it.
Our spirits know it.
Seasonal Affective Disorder - appropriately shortened to SAD - is a type of depression connected to a recurring seasonal pattern. For many people, symptoms begin during the shorter, darker days of fall and winter.
SAD.
And, sad.
Interesting, isn’t it, how easily weather can become more than weather?
Spiritual direction is one of several aspects of my work, and in that part of my ministry, one of the questions I sometimes ask people is:
“What is the weather of your soul today?”
Sunny?
Stormy?
Foggy?
Is it cloudy with a chance of “please don’t ask me one more thing”?
I believe that weather metaphors can give us some language for what can be difficult to name.
The truth is, many of us - and many of the children and families entrusted to our care - have been navigating a long season of cloudy days.
Not meteorologically.
Socially.
Politically.
Spiritually.
For folx whose families, identities, bodies, schools, communities, or futures feel threatened or uncertain, the forecast has felt overcast for quite some time.
Some are not waiting for the clouds to roll in. They are already living underneath them…which makes me think about Isaiah:
“…if you offer your food to the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the afflicted,
then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday.” - Isaiah 58:10, NRSVUE
Did you catch that?
If. Then.
If you tend to hunger.
If you attend to affliction.
Then light rises.
And this is not an isolated thought. Just a few verses earlier, Isaiah describes the kind of worship God desires: loosening the bonds of injustice, letting the oppressed go free, sharing bread with the hungry, and sheltering those without homes.
And then?
“Your light shall break forth like the dawn.”
In Isaiah, light is not positive thinking.
Light is connected to what we do about the darkness.
Whew.
I cannot control Minnesota’s weather. No amount of prayer, complaining, refreshing my weather app, or side-eyeing the clouds will make the sun appear on command.
But there is another kind of weather that is not entirely beyond our reach.
The climate of our communities is shaped by choices.
By policies.
By whose voices are heard.
By whose needs matter.
By who participates - and who does not.
As ministry leaders, we get to teach people that faith does not require them to merely endure the forecast. We can help them notice what is happening, tell the truth about who is getting wet, and discover the tools available to help change the conditions.
And those of us who are deemed eligible have one of those tools close at hand next month:
Go vote.
Not because voting fixes everything.
Not because one ballot instantly clears every cloud.
But because justice requires participation.
Check the weather of your soul.
Check the weather around the people entrusted to your care in ministry.
Then ask:
Where is God inviting us to make some light?