Getting to Know the Trees

 

One of the legacies my father has left me is a knowledge of trees. He was neither an arborist nor a lumberjack nor a craftsman who worked extensively with wood. Rather, he was a farmer alert to the beauty around him in the natural world. When I was a young child, he started to teach me the unique traits of different trees as we walked along roads and trails, wherever we might be. I marvel at the diversity within the "mixed forest" ecosystem in which I live, where evergreens and deciduous trees live side by side.

I no longer live in a rural area, and I notice that students raised in the city have very limited vocabularies when it comes to trees. They know "bark" and "tree" and "pine cone" and "Christmas tree." Why might it be valuable to know the trees by name? 

When we see human beings just as "people" in general, we don't feel related to them much. Yet, those we've met and gotten to know by name are the ones we begin to care about and pay attention to. In the same way, knowing a birch, a spruce, a mulberry bush, and an oak focuses our attention on a particular tree as a thing of beauty. Each one brings something glorious into our lives--the story of Indigenous people and the ways they turned birches into canoes, the awareness that spruce wood is used in pianos and violins, the mulberries we can pick and sample in July, and the vast oak that provides shade from a blazing sun.

Some new trees I've gotten to know this summer are known either as the service berry or the Saskatoon berry or the June berry. They can be found as bushes or trees that grow to about three times the height of a human. They have a special place in Indigenous culture, as highlighted in this article by Robin Wall Kimmerer.  I noticed the berries on one of my neighbourhood walks; these trees had been planted by the city on the boulevards of a subdivision built perhaps 30 years ago. 

Other than the birds, nobody else seems to be interested in them. Now that I know the service berry, I pay attention to it and am grateful for it in a more specific way than just "Thank you, God, for making the trees." In my suburban setting, my walks and bike rides are enriched by knowing the trees I pass by, one at a time.

Three Liturgies

 About six months ago, I was gifted a copy of Every Moment Holy, Volume 1 by Douglas K. McKelvey. This small book contains readings that can be used as prayers for many everyday occasions. It invites the reader to see events like going shopping, watching a sunset, and moving into a new dwelling as times of sacred ceremony. Everything in our lives can be connected to the Creator who gives us life and breath.

It is in this spirit that I share three liturgies I wrote for occasions that were not addressed in this book. It would be appropriate to end each one with an "Amen," which means "Let it be so."

Liturgy for a "Project"

Where we've been given room to live--indoors and out of doors--we sometimes envision improvements. We desire to bring more beauty and order and design, more welcome and joy.

The vision is grand and the work is satisfying. Grant that when it feels like drudgery or when setbacks and delays push the vision further into the future that you, Lord, will give us patience. Enable us to accept that plans unfold differently than we might wish and with less efficiency than we desire.

Help us to see that every stage of this project is an act of worship. Help us to seize opportunities for working together--with tradespeople, with neighbours who lend a tool, with walkers who show interest and with those who sell us the raw materials we need.

In the mini-economy of this project, give us a mind of stewardship and care over this piece of property you are loaning us. May we be able to pass it on in due time in better condition than we received it.

Liturgy before a Zoom meeting

I'm about to connect with other human beings, but I will not be in their physical presence. I will see their faces and hear their voices, but it will be easy to see them as abstractions.

Help me, O Lord, to ascribe full humanity to each one of them by being attentive and transparent, focused and vulnerable in the conversations we have. Help me to remember people's names and the things they have shared with me before.

Keep me from opening other tabs or multi-tasking. Help me to be as present virtually as I would be physically. Guide the speaking and listening, that it may all be done with grace and humility.

Liturgy for something Lost

Lord, you told parables about items and people that were lost--a single sheep, a single coin, an adult child--and then were found again. Great rejoicing resulted in community celebration.

Right now something needed is lost. You know exactly where it is. Please move forward the people and processes so this lost item may be found again.

It's only a material thing, with limited value, but it's something that enables thriving and service to others. I'm not the only one concerned about a lost item. Others have lost possessions, bringing great worry. Others are unable to replace their essentials. This liturgy is for them too.

While we wait and trust you, help us to dwell on things that cannot be lost, including your promise never to leave or forsake us, the truth of Jesus' resurrection from the dead, and the continued advance of the Kingdom of Heaven.