Christian Viewpoint: How swim crossing of Loch Ness washes worries away and brings the divine so much closer
Register for free to read more of the latest local news. It's easy and will only take a moment.
My friend Aileen swam the breadth of Loch Ness recently – a 2.1km distance covered in one hour 19 minutes, writes John Dempster.
She loves swimming with a friend in the open water, the chat dying away as they plunge deeper, and are “just quietly there in the moment”.
And she adds: “You get that sense of peace, and everything, all the worries of everyday life wash away.”
During the months of Covid-19 especially, Aileen says: “Swimming has been literally a godsend in terms of coping with life.”
I ask her whether, in that kind of environment, she has a heightened awareness of God, and she tells me: “I can’t help but feel God’s presence in these times of quiet and stillness.”
I think Aileen’s connection with God during her wild swimming outings is both a symbol and an example of the practice of meditation, when we are immersed in the environment of the spirit, placing a certain distance between ourselves and our concerns and drawing strength from God.
Towelled dry after her regular swims, Aileen is relaxed and radiant as she and her pal drive home.
Nevertheless, gradually, the experience diminishes and the cares and concerns that are always a part of everyday life crowd in again, though less stridently, less urgently.
Just as it is vital for our bodies to stay in touch with the natural world of God’s creation of which we are part, so it is vital for our spirits to stay in touch with the Spirit of God.
We each need to make a space in our lives in ways appropriate to us where we can meditate, our thoughts shaped by the great story found in the Bible, and listen for promptings from God, for “every word that comes from the mouth of God” as Jesus said.
Living words, dropped into our hearts. But the great Christian challenge is to be conscious at one and the same time of the everyday nitty-gritty and of the environment of the spirit.
Few of us achieve this constantly – it’s a gift rather than something we can produce.
Sometimes we must swim on, stroke by struggling stroke when it seems that our swimming companion has deserted us.
And then we realise again that we are not really alone and feel something of the deep peace of God as we face the waves of life’s difficulties.
“Each swim is a different swim,” says Aileen.
“It may be at the same place, but it’s a subtly different experience.”
And so it is on those days when the gift of stillness descends on us as we meditate and we hear the whisper of God.
Always the same voice, but speaking the words we need to absorb day by day as we cross the loch of life, heading for the far shore.
