Tag Archives: Sacred Souvenirs

Altering Altars

05 Sunday Feb 2012

Posted by in Good Reads, Soul Care

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“Human beings may separate things into as many piles as we wish — separating spirit from flesh, sacred from secular, church from world.  But we should not be surprised when God does not recognize distinctions we make between the two.  Earth is so thick with divine possibility that it is a a wonder we can walk anywhere without cracking our shins on altars.”  — Barbara Brown Taylor, An Altar in the World, page 15

How many altars will I bump into today?  And of that universe, how many will I note?  And what about the notables that have already happened?  Like…

Those first words penned at five a.m., while sitting in my favorite chair by candlelight with a cup of cappuccino nearby….

Immunizing myself with a shot of ‘spiritual’ words — today’s booster, courtesy of my second read of An Altar in the World, Chapter 3, “The Practice of Wearing Skin” — Incarnation…

Eating brunch at a busy local diner full of of good smells and conversation, many all at once, against background chimes of forks and spoons and knives and china being set and removed by hard-working servers helping us to enjoy their Sunday best…if not our own…

And what about these to come — do they count?:

Reading more of my second Ernest Hemingway novel for the month — this one, A Farewell to Arms — and losing myself in its unfolding story and restraining myself from counting the author’s many use of ‘and’ and wondering if I’ll love it as much as the first one completed last week, A Sun Also Rises…and the next one coming up, The Old Man and the Sea…

Cooking an easy supper, then baking two dozen chocolate chip cookies before…

Parking myself in front of the television to watch the Super Bowl — and if not the game, then at least the commercials and half-time entertainment…

But before all that, what about now, what about while writing this, weighing whether or not I should instead pet poodle fur of one who wishes me not to write

Afire with Reality

03 Wednesday Nov 2010

Posted by in Life at Home, Soul Care, The Great Outdoors, Writing

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I looked outside my bedroom window this morning to a blaze of autumn color peeking above the rooftops.

Delivered by the rising sun, the tree’s glowing beauty demanded a second look, so I gazed upon it for a while before finally searching out my camera to preserve the moment.  Yet, as with any sacred souvenir I’ve ever attempted to capture, the image I have is less than what I experienced first-hand.

The autumn-blazed tree reminds me of other numious moments in life that defy tidy summaries:  the birth of a child, say, or the marriage between man and woman or for me, the taking of Holy Communion.   To explain them at all is to explain them away.

I am reminded of words written by C.S. Lewis on the subject of truth and reality:  “truth is always about something, but reality is that about which truth is.” Somewhere, in all my many readings, I’ve stumbled across the thought that goodness and beauty and truth are conductors of Reality.  Reality with a capital “R” — the very word many Christian mystics use for God.  After all, how can one explain any of the three — in words?  Yet we know truth when we hear it.  Beauty when we see it.  Goodness when touched by it.

One of my very favorite biblical stories — a mystical one, of course —  comes from the third chapter of Exodus.  It’s the story of how Moses stumbled upon God by taking a closer look at a burning bush.  Well one stumble leads to another, and before Moses had barely taken off his sandals, God had commissioned Moses to go to Egypt, to set God’s people free.  To this shocking left-field demand, Moses volleys back a nonsensical sort of “Who’s on First” response, by asking God to tell him His name.  And unlike Moses, not one to beat around a blazing bush, God gives Moses His name.  In two short syllables, it’s often translated as  “I AM” or “I AM WHO I AM.”

God’s name goes to show how much can be conveyed, even when words are few.  Then there are these, found in Book VII of Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh:

“Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God,
But only he who sees takes off his shoes;
The rest sit around and pick blackberries.”

 

Home

15 Tuesday Dec 2009

Posted by in Life at Home

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Today my mind flits between two homes.  Neither are mine.

The first, of course, is here in Brazosport.  Spending time amongst familiar surroundings and faces is always good.  Yet, there is something about returning to a place that makes one feel as if they are returning to life from the grave.   It’s a bit chilling to think this way, but I’m not the only one to have these thoughts.  In an email yesterday, a local friend wrote these words — “Rhonda and I just hang our heads and say, “We sure do miss Janell….”.

Perhaps I need to read Thomas Wolfe’s final novel, “You Can’t Go Home Again.”  I anticipate a few gifts waiting in this title, which may speak to where I am in life right now.

And where am I today in life?  I am haunted by that seasonal song  first sung by Bing Crosby  —  “I’ll be Home for Christmas” — realizing for the first time, that this song will never be true for me again.  Home and the hope of new gatherings of family around the fireplace that Mom kept burning bright all died with Mom.

In my mind today are thoughts of Dad and the nursing home where he now lives.  It is Tuesday after all, and every Tuesday afternoon is devoted to spending time with Dad.  I wonder how Daddy is today.  Is he more there than not?  Friends are kind to ask after Daddy’s state of health.  To one friend yesterday, I recall saying that Dad was just a shell of his former self.  And that his shell was really broken and fragile, carried by others from one place to another, to attend to the business of living.

Daddy will never be home again.  And I don’t just mean the home he shared with Mom, but the the here-and-now home of this world.  And these seashells that litter the beach, that we pick up on our long walks with our dogs…these seashells remind me of Daddy.  Some are paper-thin just like Daddy’s skin, a little frayed around the edges.  Rarely do I find a shell left fully intact from its rough and tumble ride on the surf.  Most of the washed up shells on the beach are mere shadows of their former glory.  I pick them up carefully and wash out their sandy remains to take them home with me.  They will become a sacred souvenir to remind me of my time here at the beach.

One unexpected gift of our trip is it will allow me to once again go home for Christmas.  I’ll go bearing gifts of washed up  broken seashells from this eastern sandy shore that so far has been absent of visible sun and blue skies.

It will be to my own home that I go, the one that sits in Mesta Park.  If one doesn’t leave home for long, one can go home again and it will feel and smell like home and nothing much important will have changed.  Except for this one change:  There in Mesta Park, I will become the home to which my family goes to for Christmas.