I'm a father now, and changing diapers is a holy thing

My friend Danielle sent me a book full of prayers and liturgies for all sorts of quotidian occasions. Every Moment Holy, it’s called. Every moment really is, isn’t it?

The table of contents is full of titles like: liturgies for daybreak, midday, nightfall; liturgy for the preparation of a meal, for the keeping of bees, for the planting of flowers, for the morning of a yard sale; liturgy for a sick day, for missing someone, for the death of a dream; liturgy upon seeing a beautiful person, upon hearing birdsong, for the paying of bills. Things like that.

There are a full two separate liturgies for changing diapers. For there are, I now know more intimately than ever before, oh so many diapers in this world that need changing.

Emma and I have a daughter now. Her name is Juniper. She was born in early May.

I have become a father now. I have become it, and am becoming it, every holy moment of every day since.

And yes, of course, in so many ways I was becoming it all along with stacks and stacks and years and years of holy moments that preceded Juniper’s birthday. But the holiness of every moment really stands out, all on its own, at those sharp thresholds that carry us officially from one identity into the next.

At the threshold, I was rooted in the radical honor of being with Emma—witnessing her power in spirit and muscle—during every single rush of her labor. I was immersed in the ineffable privilege of receiving my daughter as she somersaulted out of her mother’s womb into this world, first submersed in the waters of the birthing tub, and then surfaced for a first breath and brought to her mother’s breast, the new center of her world.

At the threshold, I was mesmerized, washed in every small detail of that stretch of hours while Emma labored, and of those first hours (or minutes? or eternities? holy moments!) gawking at our child. The one right there. That one, in this very moment. The one with her own appetite, her own pulse, her own spirit, her own bowels.

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Every moment is holy. And sometimes life makes that obvious.

It’s fortunate for us, how life works. Though it doesn’t always feel fortunate, because it’s not always birth, sometimes it’s birth’s opposite, or something in between. But one way or another it’s fortunate that life, from time to time at the sharp thresholds, takes us by the scruff and demands that we be awake to the sacred.

Here’s the thing though: Barring life’s occasional insistence, it’s up to us to make a practice of being awake to most of the holy moments.

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A word of caution, however: Try not to put it on yourself to be awake to every holy moment. That’s simply too much for any single practitioner to contain. And it’s okay. It’s not up to you to imbue moments with holiness by noting them. They’re sanctified all on their own, and your consciousness at any given moment will not add to or detract from the sacred authority of every single moment.

So sleep sometimes too. Sleep is vital. But how about we make a practice—or better yet, just today, one time that you wouldn’t have otherwise—how about you be awake to that one moment, the one you’re thinking of right now. How was that moment a holy moment?

And with that, you’ll have to pardon me. I need to go wake a sleeping baby and change a diaper.