1. What daily activities such as cooking, sharing a meal, or doing chores are acts of devotion for
you?

2. Have you ever had an experience where you felt your soul was “on its knees?” What changed in your life because of the experience?

3. Where in nature have you felt participation in something greater than yourself?

4. Have you or anybody you know ever felt "spoken to" by animals or inanimate objects? What happened?

5. What holy object such as rosary beads or special garments connect you to the Divine?

6. Share your responses about the idea of each person having a unique signature in the world such as the farmer’s furrows. What could your unique signature be?

7. What can you learn from children’s natural awe that could help you on your own spiritual path?

8. Who is the best spiritual teacher of devotion for you?

Possible Practices

1. Make a list of traditional devotional practices you have used over the years. Perhaps as a child you said a prayer at bedtime. Perhaps you say grace before your meals. Do you chant, sing hymns or devotional songs? Then add to your list everyday activities you also consider to have a devotional quality to them. Journal about the meaning you assign to one of these activities. Consider how you might expand your practice of devotion in everyday life this week.

2. One way to combine an act of devotion with the world around you is to "pray the news." Compose a prayer after listening to or reading media reports of something happening in your community right now. Extend your prayer to include all people having a similar experience right now.

3. Go outdoors and see if you find something in nature that you regard as devotional (such as the corn saying its evening prayer or the frogs singing God’s praise).

4. Identify moments of devotion during a meal. Review the definitions of spirituality (see link above) as you make a spiritually literate reading of the act of sharing food..

4.Journal about acts of devotion by others that inspire and inform you.

Visit the Devotion homepage for more ways to practice this spiritual quality. Follow the links in the left column to:

  • a collection of quotations on compassion
  • book recommendations
  • book excerpts and teaching stories
  • film recommendations
  • music and art meditations
  • a daily cue, reminder, vow, and blessing for compassion
  • a prayer or mantra
  • personal explorations including imagery and journal exercises
  • practices and spiritual exercises
  • questions for discussion, storytelling, sharing
  • take action with household, group, and community projects
  • and more

Prepared by Persephone Zill with contributions from Frederic and Mary Ann Brussat