Sunday
Every tree, every meadow, every stream, every wave rolling in on the beach … each of us sees them with different vision. We bring our own different backgrounds, perspectives, needs, interests, desires, and problems to whatever we see.
—Brian McLaren
Monday
If the Sun is the source of flow in the economy of nature, what is the “Sun” of a human gift economy, the source that constantly replenishes the flow of gifts? Maybe it is love.
—Robin Wall Kimmerer
Tuesday
Twice per year, we pause the Daily Meditations to ask for your support. If you have been impacted by the CAC’s programs (including these Daily Meditations) and are financially able, please consider donating. We appreciate every gift, as we are committed to keeping our work and these Meditations accessible to all.
Wednesday
In the backyard of our Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque, a massive 150-year-old Rio Grande cottonwood tree spreads its gnarled limbs over the lawn. Before we come inside to pray, work, or teach any theology, its giant presence has already spoken a silent sermon over us.
—Richard Rohr
Thursday
From the spiritual tradition of the black community, I learned that we are all God’s creatures. I grew up with people who taught us how to respect and appreciate nature, to study nature’s secrets, to reverence the very soil beneath our feet.
—Thea Bowman
Friday
Being Franciscan-hearted is knowing and feeling oneself as part of everything—from the smallest molecule, to the tree, to the sun that was out this morning. This vast soul connection then interweaves us all together in a community.
—Joan Brown
Week Eighteen Practice
Beholding
Father Richard shares a practice from his years of leading retreats in wilderness settings:
When I have sent people into the woods on a retreat, I tell them to draw a symbolic line in the sand somehow and truly expect things on the other side to be special, invitational, or even a kind of manifestation. It always works. On the other side of that log, or lawn, or “line in the sand,” we start beholding. Someone who is truly beholding is, first of all, silenced with the utter gratuity of a thing, a tree, a bird, even an insect. We find ourselves allowing it to have an inherent dignity and voice. We let it give us a leap of joy in the heart and in the senses. To behold is to allow and to taste our awe in the wonder of nature.
Beholding happens when we stop trying to “hold” and allow ourselves to “be held” by the other. We are completely enchanted by something outside and beyond ourselves. Maybe we should speak of “behelding” because, in that moment, we are being held more than really holding, explaining, or understanding anything by ourselves. We feel ourselves being addressed more than addressing something else. This radically changes our situation and perspective.
I invite you to “behold” some things! We will seldom be disappointed. Look at a tree, for example, until you see it in its “absolute truth” as one instance of the eternal self-emptying of God into creation. When we behold the tree in this way, we move beyond its mere “relative truth” as either a beech or an elm, big or small, useful or useless, healthy or dying, ours or not ours, hardwood or soft wood, etc. We are allowing the tree to reveal its inherent dignity, as it is, without our interference. It becomes an epiphany and the walls of our world begin to expand.
Reference:
Adapted from Richard Rohr, Just This (CAC Publishing, 2017), 99–101.
Image Credit and inspiration: YS Santonii, Untitled (detail), 2023, photo, USA, Unsplash. Click here to enlarge image. We gently receive nature in new ways, perhaps by tenderly touching and gazing to see a new detail.
