My college aged nephew was visiting from Maine last weekend. One of the stops on his tour of NYC was the Museum of Modern Art. He wanted to see Van Gough’s Starry Night (which we did, after making our way through a sea of other people with the same desire!). And as is always the case in museums, beyond the famous works there were unexpected treasures that caught our eyes.

For me, one of those treasures was a grouping of photographs from a series by photographer Aaron Siskind titled “The Pleasures and Terrors of Levitation.” One of the many images in this series is included above; singular moments of individuals caught in mid-air. Each person is posed differently against a blank backdrop. Are they rising? Falling? Suspended? The details are left to the imagination of the viewer….

When we think of monasticism today, we might think of Benedict of Nursia (6th century), or Theresa of Avila (16th century), or Thomas Merton (20th century). But the man who perhaps started the monastic movement in the first place is much less well-know. Antony of Egypt (356) lived a few hundred years earlier than Benedict, and his feast day is today, Friday, January 17….

n this week’s written meditation, I offer some words from a guest poet. Hamza Mohamed is an eighth-grade writer from Minneapolis. He is a member of the After-School writing lab and the Young Author’s council program at his public middle school. As we move closer to Inauguration Day and as we continue to discern how to respond most faithfully to a new political administration, here is written work and some explanatory words from one of our younger citizens. Titled “If I Was President,” this poem was published recently in the book Let This Be Our Anthem: Call to Action from Young Writers to the Next President….