Session overview: Reclaiming the holy in an overstuffed, commercialized season—learning to see sacred ground everywhere you stand.
The Tension of the Season
For many people, this season is a time of celebration, gift-giving, and connecting with people and with our better selves, which may or may not have any religious beliefs attached to it. Generally, many people seem to have a slight or substantial shift in their attention during these last few weeks of the year:
We’re told this is a sacred season, but it often feels like a competition, like a race.
Peace on earth feels impossible when we can’t even find peace in our own schedules.
Every year, we pivot from Thanksgiving gratitude to Black Friday frenzy in a matter of hours. We go from “count your blessings” to “count your coupons.”
Obviously, we know that’s not true; however, this can be a jarring time as we make the hard pivot from a single day devoted to cultivating gratitude, and into a season where though peace and joy are supposed to be central, consumption and commercialism tend to dominate, as much as we try to prevent them from doing so.
Though a slower pace seems to be the invitation, many of us see the velocity of our lives accelerate and our calendars become fuller than usual. That is the tension of the holidays: straining for the essential while being distracted by the decorative. What I’d like us to think about today is to embrace the sacred in whatever that means to you.
On Thanksgiving years ago, we had two interactions with our children that were really interesting, in light of the opposing forces of spirituality and materialism that compete for our attention right now.
At the dinner table with our children, my wife asked our then 16-year-old son, “What are you grateful for?” His response was a bit of teenage awkwardness followed by a questioning of why we as a culture are asking that question today, and saying compulsory gratitude feels forced and disingenuous. “Why just one day of gratitude? Why ask that question today and not yesterday or tomorrow? So, I said, fair enough, we’re going to ask you tomorrow—and you better be ready with an answer!
A couple of hours later, I was standing in the kitchen having what may or may not have been my third dinner, when my 12-year-old walked in with Christmas decorations and announced that Thanksgiving was now over. When I told her I still had at least two meals left to go, she said, “Sorry, it’s Christmas time now.” Time to put away the thankfulness.
I like that juxtaposition: my son resisting the idea of a single day of ceremonial gratitude, and my daughter telling me we’re moving into Christmas mode and a full day of gratitude is not going to be possible.
Question: Have you already packed up gratitude? Has that been put away on a shelf and replaced by something else?
Black Friday is a holy day of a very different variety. I’ve always joked that on Thursday afternoon, we gather with our families and friends to give thanks for all we have, and a few hours later, we body check strangers in big box stores so we can get all the stuff we don’t yet have. We are conditioned to temporary satisfaction and expectation addition. We need the next event, the next season, the next big day to look forward to, which pulls us from the present (where gratitude is) to the future (where need is.)
These are going to be the tensions: Enough vs. Lack/ What I Have vs. What I Want/ Contentment vs. Dissatisfaction
Question: Where are you living in a place of perceived lack or want or dissatisfaction?
Sacred: set apart for a particular purpose.
Opposite of sacred: aimless, purposeless
Holiday means “holy day,” a sacred day, a day set apart for the purpose of dwelling on goodness and gratitude, and in this traditional religious sense, God’s relationship with humanity. A holiday is an intentional awareness of the spiritual things, a changing of priorities, an altered attention.
When we lose purpose, even spiritual practices become hollow.
Reclaiming sacredness means intentionality.
In much of Europe, holiday means “vacation,” a getting away from routine and ordinary, a departure from the everyday. Those two definitions of holiday (sacred, set-apart day, and a vacation) can help us think about our default condition: about how we cultivate gratitude, compassion, and generosity. Are these things part of the rhythm of our ordinary days, or are they occasional mindsets we spend a brief time in before returning to our routine?
Thinking about Advent and Hannukkah made me think of the OT story of Moses, God appearing to the soon-to-be hero of the Israelites through a burning bush, and the voice of God tells Moses to take off his sandals in reverence because the place where he is standing is holy ground. He is told that that piece of ground at that moment is holy, sacred, set apart—that this day is sacred. The ground was always holy; awareness was the key.
Principle: The sacred isn’t out there, it’s wherever we bring our full attention, whether we’re religious or not
As we move through this season, but especially beyond it, the key is in remembering that wherever we are standing is holy ground, in that our present is always a place and time in which to be aware of the deeper things happening and the opportunity in them.
It’s not about the ground. It is about us who stand on it. When we dwell on what we are set apart for the purpose of, what kind of sanctified we want to be, then we will be pulled from the senseless into the sacred.
The most difficult time for charities and nonprofits to find volunteers is in January, when many people’s seasonal compassion subsides. What if our empathy was not an event, not a date on the calendar, but empathy was the calendar?
What if we developed a perennial gratitude instead of an annual one, a peace on earth orientation that was not temporary?
Growing up Catholic, we had Holy days of Obligation, which, as a teenager, seemed like an odd name and idea: compulsory reverence. We treat sacredness as a calendar event, but spirituality was never meant to be seasonal.
The goal: transform temporary compassion into a sustained orientation of presence and gratitude.
We have all sorts of unofficial holidays every day: National Donut Day, International Siblings Day, National Dog Day.
One way to cultivate the sacred in the ordinary is to finish the phrase: The world would be a lot better if people would just… and then use those answers to set apart a day for each.
Today could be Be a Better Listener Day
Tomorrow might be Forgive Someone You Have A Grudge Against Day.
The day after that is Turn Off Your Phone Day.
The day after that is Stop Criticizing Yourself Day
You make the days sacred by setting yourself apart to the work of what matters and the work of what is lacking in the world. In the small and close, in the places you have a front row seat to. Holiness isn’t somewhere else. It’s right here—if we slow down long enough to notice.
Everyday Sacred
You don’t need candles or choirs to touch the sacred.
You can find it in:
a deep breath before a difficult conversation,
a quiet walk without your phone,
a moment of laughter that catches you off guard.
Turning Ritual into Resistance
Refusing frenzy is a spiritual act. Slowing down is countercultural compassion. Decide one thing to make sacred this month—a walk, a meal, a conversation—and protect it fiercely.
Practical ways to “sanctify” the ordinary:
Micro-pauses: brief stillness before transitions.
Reverent noticing: say, “This, too, is holy” when beauty or pain catches you.
Acts of service: simple kindness as ritual.
Every time you pause and pay attention, you sanctify the moment.
Closing Blessing
May you see holiness hiding in the ordinary.
May you treat your breath, your body, your relationships as sacred space.
And may this chaotic season remind you that everywhere you stand—yes, even here—is holy ground.
Key Takeaways
Holiness = attention + intention.
Sacredness is portable.
Ritual can resist chaos.
Morning Companion — Session 4
Key Ideas
Holy = intentionally set apart for what matters.
You’re allowed to find the sacred outside institutions and clichés.
Your presence, attention, and compassion are holy acts.
Reflection Prompts
Where do you feel the most disconnected from anything sacred right now?
What quietly feels holy to you; music, nature, laughter, service, silence?
How has your understanding of God/faith/meaning shifted in recent years?
If one everyday habit became a small ritual of awareness, what would it be?
5. Where have you quietly “packed up” your sense of the sacred?
6. If “God” is a loaded word, what words feel closer to how you sense goodness/meaning?
7. What would it mean to keep one thing simple and set apart this season?
Quotes:
“Attention is the beginning of devotion.” – Mary Oliver
“The place where you are standing is holy ground.” – Exodus 3:5
Practices for Today
Sacred Pause: Choose one 3–5 minute window today. No screens. Just breathe, notice, or pray/curse/journal.
Holy Trade: Swap one “obligatory” consumer task for one act of mercy or generosity.
Naming Ritual: Before sleep, name 3 moments of goodness or beauty from the day, no matter how small.
