The Graze V.128: Leaves to Soil
Dear Friends:
My mother is visiting me and my family at Mission Farm from Colorado. Over the past week we have watched the hillsides transform into muted yellows, brilliant reds and now brown, as the leaves fall to the forest floor. We have walked through the hills and enjoyed the sweet smell of fall. We even caught sight of a bald eagle swooping down for its breakfast before us. Of course, we baked cookies - (pumpkin cookies actually!)
There is a natural human impulse to grasp the beauty and feeling of these autumn days. We want to capture the moment in a photo, hold onto the fragrance and stop the hillsides in the midst of this transformation. We often do that in our lives with moments we cherish, places we feel comfort, people we love.
Yet the forest teaches us about the cycle of life. This is the pattern of nature: Leaves to soil, moles to eagle food, frog flesh to turkey vulcher. Trees sink into the forest floor to become rich earth - a home for mosses, ferns and brambles.
This is also the pattern of our lives - not only physically but also spiritually. As we face change in our lives and in the systems and organizations around us, there is an unchangeable presence that can sustain us. While we feel the things we love slipping away, our experience of grief can open us to a deeper way of living. The world is in endless change. And yet, the message of our faith - of physicists, ecologics and mystics - is that each life is radically connected to all of life with nothing so small that it can be lost. Out of death comes new life.
May you carry this assurance and faith as you love and care for one another,
Lisa