The Earth is "full of harsh realities, but sometimes it's just paradise." from the movie narrative, EARTH
I dearly love to travel and to watch movies. Although I have had the opportunity to visit the Northwest, the Gulf Coast, the Midwest, British Victoria, the Carribean and Italy (my favorite pilgrimage), my life as a monastic does not allow me just to embark on a new adventure anytime I feel like it. To compensate for this desire, I read travel memoirs and watch the Travel Channel. Last night I took a breathtaking journey of Mother Earth as I watched the movie EARTH( Disney Nature Films) . I have come to love nature films, but this movie was by far one of the most spellbounding portraits of nature I have ever witnessed. It gifted me with such "landscapes of spectacular beauty" that I will probably never have the opportunity to visit. From the frigid Arctic to the Kalahari Desert, from the tropical rain forests to the vast blue oceans, the photography experience was a gift from God. Time captured budding forth of flowers, mushrooms, and leaves spoke of vigilance to me- if only I could be present to see a bud open its face to the sun. The film depicts the migration of polar bears, elephants, and whales journeying thousands of miles in search of food and water for their family. Besides the long journey, they must endure the threat of predatory creatures who are also struggling to survive. The aspects of global warming threaten the livelihood of the living creatures of our planet. But the creatures of the earth persevere even in the dryness of the desert and the turbulence of the ocean.
As I watched this earth's journey, I thought of the Genesis story- God's creation of the heavens and the earth, night and day, sky, water, vegetation, plants, trees, swarms of living creatures, birds of the sky, great sea monsters, cattle and creeping things, wild animals, and male and female. God saw that the gift of all creation was good. And so should I! How could one watch this film and not feel grateful. How could one watch it and not reverence the earth. How could one watch it and not realize its message of God's presence and beauty all around and at every moment.
Christine Valters Paintner, in her book Water, Wind, Earth and Fire, quotes Peter London to exemplify earth as a metaphor for "our internal landscapes and spiritual journeys:"
Each of the great forms that Earth takes- mountains and hills and plains and valleys and meadows and steppes and swamps and marshes and deserts and forests and jungles and savannas and beaches and islands- each of these geographies we transmute to geobiographies of our own personal journey across time and circumstance. We too rise up, we ascend, we fall, only to rise and fall over and over, until we are leveled and become one again with the single mantle that is the resting ground and birthing ground of it all....The finite summit of the mountain's peak, the river's final arrival to the sea, the clearing in the depths of the woods, serve as exemplars and as metaphors for the often steep and uncertain and perilous journey that is our life. (Peter London, Drawing Closer to Nature)
This journey around the world last night is still with me. I watched it again today and I believe it will be a keeper- a meditation I will use when I feel the dryness of the desert and need a pick-me-upper on my daily journey through life. I hope I will remember its vivid images whenever I pray the words of Psalm (103) 104:
Bless the Lord, my soul!
Lord, my God, you are great indeed!
You are clothed with majesty and glory,
robed in light as with a cloak.
You spread out the heavens like a tent;
you raised your palace upon the waters...
You bring bread from the earth,
and wine to gladden our hearts,
oil to make our faces gleam,
food to build our strength.
The trees of the Lord drink their fill,
the cedars of Lebanon, which you planted.
There the birds build their nests;
junipers are the home of the stork.
The high mountains are for wild goats;
the rocky cliffs, a refuge for badgers...
All of these look to you
to give them food in due time.
When you give to them, they gather;
when you open your hand, they are well filled.
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