Lately, I’ve noticed an abundance of fungi in our yard and woods. Perhaps it is the humid conditions of Ohio in late summer fall but they’ve cropped up all through the yard in the loamy soil and decaying logs of our woods.

I’ve become fascinated with the variety and types and like Dr. Egon Spengler from Ghostbusters (played by the late Harold Ramis),  I’ve crossed the streams with the group of organisms that includes molds, spores and fungus.  Unlike Egon I do not collect them unless you count “collecting photos”!

I’ve spent time trying to figure out why I am intrigued with fungi.  What are these things anyway?  They are not plants or bacteria (I looked it up!) They are heterotrophs which I vaguely remember from high school biology class (Thank you, Sr. Peg!).  Heterotrophs are like us because they have to acquire and take in food to stay alive.  They secrete digestive enzymes in their environment and absorb dissolved molecules.  We do something similar when we take in food and our stomach enzymes dissolve it into the molecules we need to live.  Fungi do all of this in soil or on dead matter like fallen trees.  Pretty neat, huh?

Creation. The circle of life.  Everything has a place and everything is connected. The fungi feed and grow from the soil and decaying wood. We feed and grow from plants and animals.  We are part of creation.

In early August, I attended a Franciscan Day and the guest speaker was Fr. Daniel Horan, OFM Assistant Professor of Systematic Theology at Catholic Theological Union in Chicago.  Fr. Dan challenged us to look beyond the dominion and stewardship models of Christian theology of creation and embrace a kinship or community model of creation. I felt it was important for me at a personal and spiritual level to embrace, meditate and pray with the idea of being in kinship with Creation.  How am I to be in relationship with Creation?

Getting “jazzed” about fungi is one way I enter into kinship with Creation.  My camera has been a way for me to pray and reflect.  It makes me slow down, breathe and focus on what I’m seeing.

I’ve discovered I absorb the Spirit and “digest” grace and wisdom.  By immersing myself in God, scripture, contemplation or meditation, I become one with The Creator, who gives life.  I am embraced by creation and recognize my oneness with Her.  I do not have dominion over creation.  I am called to be more than a steward.  I feel the connection of being one with creation.  I am a part of it all.  I am Creation itself.

Practice Challenge:

How do you view your place as part of Creation? Dominator? Steward? Or Part of Creation?

Who or what “feeds” you? How do you “digest” what you need to sustain spiritually sustain you?  What practices do you engage in to feed your spirit?

What “jazzes” you about Creation? About yourself? About God?

Blessings,

Christy

Ecclesiastes 3:11 “God has made everything beautiful in its time. God has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end.”

I was listening to a program on NPR about marriage as I drove home from an event earlier this month and they mentioned Michelangelo and his ideas on sculpting. (I really don’t remember the connection they made between Michelangelo and marriage!)  When Michelangelo sculpted he did not carve INTO the stone but rather sought to REMOVE stone which was not necessary.  In essence, he removed the superfluous and kept the important parts.  In his mind, the sculpture was already within the stone and his job as an artist was to chip away what was not needed and bring forth the beautiful figure within.

I pondered this in relation to what I’ve experienced spiritually.  I imagined a sculptor chipping away on stone and saw pieces of stone and dust flying away from a large chunk of rock in my mind’s eye.  I imagined the clank*clank*clank of the hammer striking the chisel and envisioned the hour after hour the sculptor worked.  Slowly the image emerged.  It was rough at first but the sculptor refined it with smaller chisels and sandpaper until the figure fully emerged from the stone.

God is like a sculptor.  God gently carves away the parts of the stone in which we are encased and slowly refines our rough edges into a thing of beauty.   In my own life, I’ve experienced the feeling of parts of myself being chipped away, polished, and refined.  Sometimes it is a painful process.  Other times the excess falls off with a gentle nudge of the chisel.  I believe God sees the work of art we all are.  God sees each one of us as unique individual sculpture molded and formed with Love and Grace.  God makes everything – and everyone – beautiful in their own time.  That’s hard to take in about myself. I am a unique and beautiful sculpture formed by the Love and Grace of the Creator.  Wow!

I invite you to reflect on that very idea – YOU are unique and beautiful and molded by Grace and Love of a Creator who created all things GOOD.  It even says it in the Good Book.  “God saw all that God had created and it was very good.”  Gen 1:31

What parts of you have been “carved away” recently?  What aspects of yourself need further polishing? How do you resist God from “taking away” what is not needed?  What is your beauty within? What aspects of yourself can you see emerging as the rough edges are polished and refined? How are you “very good”?

Remember: You ARE a work of art and you ARE good.  You are unique and special in the eyes of The Sculptor.  When you feel those rough edges or feel encased in stone, not quite fully formed, remember the unnecessary parts are being chipped away and polished.  Your beauty and goodness is emerging.  God will make all things beautiful in time.  God created all and it IS very good.

If you would like to talk more about how you are being sculpted, please contact me.  I would be honored to companion you on your journey.

Blessings always,

Christy

 

Last week I had the privilege of seeing an awe-inspiring exhibit of some of China’s terracotta warriors at the Cincinnati Museum of Art.  Nine of the 8000 terracotta figures, along with hundreds of other ancient objects, were on display in a special exhibit.  The story of these amazing works is that some pieces of terracotta were found by two Chinese farmers digging a well a well in 1974.  These figures were buried with the emperor in 210-209 BCE to protect him in the afterlife.   8000 figures of cavalrymen, infantrymen and archers were eventually discovered in 3 pits around the emperor’s burial site.

Terracotta Servant photograph by Christy Wesselman (C) Christy Wesselman

I admired the archers and cavalrymen but was particularly drawn to this little dude pictured above.  He was a stable servant and was discovered in an area surrounded by the skeletal remains of horses.  It is believed he was buried to care for the horses in the afterlife.  He is the only figure which appears kneeling on both knees.  His simple clothing and his posture indicate his lower station as a servant.  But I liked this little guy – a lot.

We had horses when I was younger so I could relate to the idea of providing care for them even in the afterlife.  Somebody’s got to feed and water the horses!  It always seemed a chore to muck stalls, water and feed the horses. I didn’t like the job of scooping up the horse manure much as a youngster.  But some of my best memories are of the sounds and smells of horses in the barn, the crunching and munching and the sweet musty smell of horse.  If I were a terra-cotta figure, I’d like to think I would have been caring for the horses.

Little Dude was my favorite (beside the terra-cotta horse figure!) He gave me much to think about as I wandered through the exhibit, snapping photos, reading the history of these amazing creations and pondering their age beyond my comprehension.  These figures were sculpted the 200’s BCE.  The immense span of time, the priceless value of the figures and the knowledge of a burgeoning non-Western culture was amazing.

Little Dude prompted a call to reflect, ponder, pray and meditate long after I left the exhibit.  Am I a servant in the way I am supposed to be? If so, how am I living that call to serve others? How do I feel called to serve others? What gifts do I really have?

What gifts do I wish I had? How does envying gifts I don’t have prevent me from fully serving others?

What prevents me from serving others as I think and feel I should be? Pride? Fear? Shame? Guilt?  What do I resist about being a servant?

What qualities of servant do I admire in prophets and teachers of my faith? What are ways in which I can be more like those prophets and teachers?  Do I serve with love and compassion? Do I serve with humility, meekness, and gentleness?

Do I engage in contemplative practices like meditation, contemplation, or scripture reading like the prophets and teachers of my faith? Do I cultivate spiritual habits of unconditional compassionate love, solitude when needed, and maintaining supportive relationships within a sangha or spiritual community?  Do I express unconditional compassionate love to others, walk in grace and forgiveness, and encourage others?

I hope these questions act as prompts for your own reflection.  You may want to write in a journal, write poetry, paint a picture, make a collage, walk with nature or take photographs in response to these questions and more.  I’d love to hear your thoughts and insights and what questions arose in you.  Feel free to share your creative projects via email or post for all to see.  If you would like to talk further, please contact me.

Blessings always,

Christy

The beauty of the earth, the beauty of the sky, the order of the stars, the sun, the moon . . . their very loveliness is their confession of God.” St. Augustine

The super moon and appearance of Mars last Friday prompted this reflection on moonlight, moon crater scars, and our response to hurts in our lives.

The thing about moon is that it is reflected light.  She has no light of her own.  She reflects the light of sun – and quite well.  She influences the tides of Mother Earth’s abundant waters.

We know from missions to the moon and lunar probes that the backside of her – the dark side of the moon – has massive craters where meteor strikes have bombarded and smashed into the lunar surface.  Her front side, the side we see in the sun’s reflected light, also shows craters and scars and millennial meteor crashes as well.  It’s fair to say this beautiful celestial object has survived the beatings of the universe for millennia.    And yet – the moon keeps on shining. Sister Moon keeps on reflecting the light of the sun showing all her scars, orbiting Earth in her unique path in her time.

In the pauses between taking photos of the beautiful moon, these thoughts occurred to me.  Do I reflect the light of God? How do I do this? How is my life part of the “confession of God”.  My first thoughts were that I am like the moon because I, too, have scars and bruises and emotional meteor strikes which are hidden on my “dark side”.   Upon deeper reflection, I hope I reflect The Light of God through the visible scars, bruises, and brokenness which people see.  The moon reflects the sun light through the craters.  The meteor strikes and holes on the moons surface are most visible during a full moon when the moon is completely reflecting the light of the sun. Do I allow my craters to fill up with the Light and reflect it to others?

I know hurt, grief, loneliness, extreme sadness – all those “negative” emotion we all try to avoid.  I’ve been bruised from the meteor strikes of others, from culture, from people who don’t “get me” and by my own guffaws, stumblings, mistakes and errors in being a human being.  The more I try to push away from those negative emotions or ignore them or the more I shame myself for messing up the more difficult it is to shine.  Pushing away from them doesn’t allow the light to shine in the cracks and crevices and craters.

I’ve learned through reading, study, meditation and prayer that if I lean into those difficult emotions, befriend them, care for them and sit with them, I can reflect the light in spite of or because of those visible craters and meteor scars.  As Rocky said, it’s about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward. How much you can take and keep moving forward.  The moon keeps getting hit and yet continues to shine. We get hurt and bruised and broken and choose to keep shining.

We all experience some kind of brokenness, bruising, scarring from the Universe’s meteor strikes.  I don’t believe the Universe is malicious although at the time it feels like most people ARE malicious.  I’d like to believe “stuff happens”. We experience suffering. It is part of the human condition. We inflict pain on one another even though we know or have been taught that’s not what we’re supposed to do.  How we respond to suffering and hurts is how we reflect The Light and how we grow as human beings.

Reflection/Journaling questions

How do you reflect The Light?  What are your meteor scars?  Which craters do you allow others to see and thus reflect light? Which meteor strikes are hidden on the dark side of your moon?

How do you reflect God’s light in spite of your own brokenness?

How do you befriend difficult emotions? What fears do you have befriending them? What would it be like to have a sit down with your anger, loneliness, shame, guilt, traumas? What is your most difficult emotion to sit with?

Remember: you are la bella luna – the beautiful moon – always. Let your light shine for all the world to see so that others may see the glory of God. (Matthew 5:16)

Blessings to you all.  Thank you for reading.

Christy

 

 

Walking through our woods this week, I spied in a tall beech tree, a hornet’s nest.  I left it well enough alone except to zoom in (140mm) with my Nikon camera.  With my naked eye I could only observe a few hornets flying around the nest but the photo revealed ones clinging to the paper-like nest and crawling in and out of the hole at the bottom.  

I marveled at the creation of chewed wood fiber mixed with hornet saliva (I had to look that up!)  Apparently, the cycle of building a nest begins with queen hornets constructing nests to house their eggs in which they lay one egg with a cell and build a comb constructing tier after tier.   Eggs eventually hatch into larvae which become sterile adult females whose job it is to build more nest and tend to the brood while the queen’s sole duty is to lay eggs from which future hornets are born in late summer.  Eventually, the queen will produce male hornets whose only purpose is to mate with queens.  These fertilized queens hide for the winter.  Next spring/summer, the cycle begins anew.

Nature teaches me – always.  I returned to the site of the hornet nest several times in the past couple of days pausing to ponder what lesson I could learn.  Don’t stir up a hornet’s nest was the thought that kept coming to me. Well, that’s just common sense, right? I’ve witnessed the harm a handful of angry hornets can inflict on pets and people and could only imagine what a colony of angry and stirred up hornets might do. (I saw a few horrible minutes of Irwin Allen’s 1978 disaster movie, The Swarm, which is about African killer bees so I figured hornets would be about the same!)

I’ve heard and even used the cliché “don’t stir up a hornet’s nest” throughout my life.  This time it gave me pause.  I pondered what it might mean for my life and my spirituality – if at all.  I came up with some questions which I list below for your journaling, pondering, praying, sharing with a spiritual director or companion or creating some artistic expression.  Perhaps you have other questions you would like to share.  Please feel free to pose those questions for all.

Reflection Questions  

What does it mean when we say “you don’t want to stir up that hornet’s nest”  or “all she’s doing is stirring up a hornet’s nest”? Do you maintain the status quo to avoid reprisals and the stings of personal attacks?

When you observe someone stirring up the status quo, do you sting and attack or do you support and encourage? Are you able to protect those who stir the paper-like nest?

How do you feel when someone challenges YOUR paper-like nest? Do you come out stingers ready? What happens inside when you get “stirred up”? Are you mindful of being “stirred up”? When you are aware of being stirred, how do you handle those feelings? 

Are you a worker or a queen? How do you respond to those around you see who are the “queens” or the “workers” who may not be like you?  Have you ever “stirred up a hornet’s nest”? What feelings did you experience challenging the status quo?  

I enjoy your feedback and emails.  I am so pleased you find my photos and thoughts a blessing on your spiritual journey.

Blessings,

Christy