Devotions with Doechii

How I curated spiritual activities for a semi-deconstructing friend group.

Back in July, Passionfroot—the incredible artist collective YouTube channel (and soon to be podcast) that I am so privileged to work with—took at group trip to Australia. Rather, three of us took a trip to Australia to meet up with the two remaining group members who already live there. We spent just about a week exploring between Sydney and the Blue Mountains, filming content, recording podcasts, and planning for the future of our platform.

While on our first trip the year prior I had been the designated car (van) renter and group chauffeur (affectionately nicknamed “Mama Max” by the group), this year I more thoroughly took on another role that I had only dabbled in during our 2024 trip: coordinating daily group spiritual activities.

The previous year, I had begun introducing the group to Lectio Divina. We didn’t do it every day, but we did it enough times for it to have left a good impression on the group, and it really catalyzed my own use of the practice in my personal life. With the majority of the team functioning with pretty standard Christian commitments, it was a good fit for something that could be done collectively without drifting into “this is a mini sermon” territory. And our one (at the time) member experiencing a deconstructive process in her faith journey was open minded enough to still find the exercise valuable, and a new way to re-engage her Christian roots.

This time though, the task was complicated by the fact that each member of the team is currently in a starkly different place in terms of beliefs and worldview. For me to lead this group of (amazing) women in spiritual exercises every day of our trip, I would need to make the activities speak a language that could meet each of them where they were at—from the most inoffensively orthodox of Christians to those teetering on the edge of atheism, and those intrigued by other forms of spirituality.

In a way this was the perfect challenge and opportunity for me. I could bring together my love for the Bible, for world religions and philosophy, and for the arts all to serve the extremely varied needs of this group of dear friends. I ended up crafting a different litany each day for us to read and reflect on as a group. I assigned each and every single line of the readings to the person who I thought that line would most resonate with, whether as an affirmation of their current position or a constructive challenge to deeper thinking.

This post is not about our first activity—which could be a story until itself. We did that first reading the day before we began filming our main content in earnest, but I wanted our first day of full-on content creation to be boosted by a spiritual affirmation of creativity. And I knew just where to go for it.

I started listening to Doechii in 2023, just about a month before her hit “What It Is” was released. Her short album from the previous year, “Oh The Places You’ll Go” was on repeat for me, and one of the stand out tracks was, oddly enough, a spoken word piece simply entitled “God.” Remembering it, I realized I had a golden opportunity to do something really impactful. I split the devotional reading into two halves: the first revolving mostly around readings about Sophia (personified Wisdom) in the book of Proverbs, with a few nods to Daoist texts sprinkled in, and secondly, after a pause for sharing reflections, the words from Doechii’s spoken piece.

While the previous day’s reading had been enjoyed, this one really made a huge impact. Doechii’s own candour and insightfulness certainly did a lot of heavy lifting. You can listen to the track (below) in conjunction with reading the litany script:

The Litany of Sophia x Doechii’s God

PART 1: LITANY OF SOPHIA

[DD]

Does not wisdom call?

Does not understanding raise her voice? [Proverbs 8:1]

[AA]

22 “The Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work,

the first of his acts of old.

[MH]

John 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was in the beginning with God.

[MK]

3 All things were made through him, and without him was not any thing made that was made.

4 In him was life, and the life was the light of men.

[EN]

5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.

[MH]

The Lord by wisdom founded the earth;

by understanding he established the heavens;

[DD]

20 by his knowledge the deeps broke open,

and the clouds drop down the dew. [Proverbs 3:19]

[AA]

To those who are called, both Jews and Gentiles, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. [1 Corinthians 1:24]

[EN]

She is a tree of life to those who lay hold of her;

those who hold her fast are called blessed. [Proverbs 3:18]

[MK]

25 For the foolishness of God is wiser than men, and the weakness of God is stronger than men.

[DD]

There exists a Being undifferentiated and complete,

Born before heaven and earth.

[AA]

Tranquil, boundless,

Abiding alone and changing not,

Encircling everything without exhaustion.

Fathomless, it seems to be the Source of all things.

[EN]

I do not know its name,

But characterize it as the Tao.

[Max]

Arbitrarily forcing a name upon it,

I call it Great….

• (Tao Teh Ching, chapters 25 and 4 - Translated by Gi-ming Shien and Eugene Rose.)

[Pause for Reflection & Sharing Insights]

Part 2: “GOD” BY DOECHII

[MK]

And I wrote down

[AA]

We must come to recognize that God is an unlimited supply

And that everyone has access

God does not run out of blessings

Someone else receiving a gift from God is not one taken away from you

And I wanna apply this and practice this in my daily life, thank you

[MH]

Receiving God's good is an act of worship

And cooperating with God's plan will manifest goodness in your life

God has lots of money

God has lots of song ideas

[EN]

Lyrics, strategies, acting jobs, lovers, friends, houses, et cetera

That is available to me

And by listening to the creator within

I will be led through the right path

And on this path I will find meaningful work

[DD]

And that was huge for me

Especially recognizing that God is an unlimited supply

There is no limitations

There is an unlimited supply of creative energy in me

[AA]

There is an unlimited supply of opportunities around me

And jobs

[EN]

and lyrics

And ideas and visions

And really accepting that is a huge change

[MK]

Because I think that, in the beginning of my weeks

I was talking about how one of my fears and creative blocks

A negative self-belief that I had

Was that I would be a one-hit wonder

[EN]

Or I could only write one really good song

Or write one really good album

[MH]

And that's because I'm limiting my beliefs

Not on myself, but on my Source

[AA]

If I am a product of the greatest artist of all time, which is God

If I am a product of the original creator

And He has an unlimited supply of creative energy

[DD]

That means I have access to an unlimited supply of creative energy

[MK]

I have an unlimited supply of lyrics and songs

[MH]

And visions and jobs

And money and houses

And I have that-, I have access to an unlimited supply

[DD]

And just really accepting that

And really tapping into it

And really practicing it

Has shifted my whole mode

And how I wanna move forward

[EN]

Now, with that being said

I also came to the realization that

If I have access to it

[AA]

And if I am a product of the greatest artist of all time

And He created everybody on this planet

Everybody has that same access

[All]

Everybody has access to this source

Why these things in particular?

The reading activity consisted, in summary, of the following content:

• Proverbs 3:18-20, 8:1, 22; John 1:1-5; 1 Cor. 1:24-25

• Tao Teh Ching chapters 25 and 4 - Translated by Gi-ming Shien and Eugene Rose

• “God” by Doechii

I have a soft spot for Daoism and am personally a bit curious about it. I always have been ever since first learning about it in high school, but within the last few years of my life I have really found myself more and more fascinated with it as a system. In that particular quote, I saw a lot of resonance with what some people might call the “Wisdom Christology” in scripture. Obviously with the Logos in John 1, I already had a lot to work with, but my mind went to the concept of Logos Spermatikos first pioneered in ancient Stoicism but brought into Christianity by thinkers like Justin Martyr. The idea is that because the world was fashioned by the Logos, there is knowledge to be gained about the Creator everywhere you look. Hence, my foray into other sources of inspiration besides (though not superceding or in opposition to) the Bible.

I chose to highlight the Proverbs passages for a handful of reasons. First, Proverbs 8 in particular was highly contentious and important during the 4th century Trinitarian debates and especially the discussion at and surrounding the council of Nicaea. It was here that the Trinitarian and Arian positions found a major point of contention, especially in the proper understanding of 8:22. The early church fathers saw in the Sophia/Hokmah of Proverbs, “Lady Wisdom,” a description of Christ pre-incarnate. I arranged the ordering of the verses in our reading to highlight and even accentuate the use of feminine pronouns in relation to the the 2nd Person of the Trinity because of this—especially considering that women made up the majority of our group and rarely get to see God presented in feminine terms with fairly direct usage of the Bible.

But of course, this combo of sacred texts set up the real linchpin of the exercise - Doechii’s reflections on God from the vantage point of a creative mind. I was so pleasantly surprised to find something like that on her album, and in the time since then Doechii has consistently dropped reminders that she is by all accounts and deep thinker who has integrated her spirituality into the (supposed) “secularity” of her music. Her stylistic fluidity speaks to something that goes well beyond the modern trend of bucking genre conventions. Doechii, to me, represents a broader cultural turn towards sincerity. I think she also represents in a very real sense what Christianity actually looks like on the ground for the average person who isn’t wrapped up too deeply in the weeds of evangelical consumer culture. Just listen to this:

To me, this was one of the most fulfilling spiritual group activities that I have ever prepared, mostly because of the utterly glowing reaction I got from the team at the end of it. Each activity we did during our trip was meaningful in its own way and sparked powerful reflections, but I think this one remains the true standout.

I’ll share some of those other reflections another time. If you’d like more on the Daoist-Christian-Stoic thing, here’s something you might consider reading.

You’re still here reading. You’re very brave. Wow. Have more random stuff. This is my favourite Doechii song it’s basically Nü-Metal.

Everything is so cool I like you thank you for reading my little blog thingy, leave a comment if you are my friend.

-Max