Weep. Seed. Weed.

During this Great Pause gripping the world, people are weeping. Perhaps you are too. I know I am. So many good folk's health and livelihoods are affected.

But creation is not. 

Given a breather, it's showing signs of joyful and playful renewal - clearer skies; cleaner rivers, lakes and seas; thriving local farmers who are mostly committed to sustainable farming practices.

 Perhaps Pentecost this year is about the Spirit working in history to seed something new - the re-syncing of people with planet "as it was in the beginning," with the added liturgical promise of this being forever, "now and ever shall be, world without end." 

Jerusalem cross gardening, as a spiritual discipline, is grounding me in the promise found in this re-syncing, helping me to "be the re-synced," or, to "be the change" which our world so desperately needs yesterday.

Jerusalem Cross Gardening of Soil.

A tree that will bear Fuji, Gala, and Honeycrisp apples
prepares to be espaliered against the fence.

In my own life this seeding has begun. The fences of my potager garden are being completed to keep the deer and moose at bay. The raised beds (in the shape of a Jerusalem cross) will soon be filled with beautiful organic soil (just need to entice my son to help move it). The chicken cage/tractor has arrived and some laying hens soon will too. Newly planted apple trees and blueberry bushes are leafing out and flowering. The herb spiral is not far behind.

So much still waits to be done, but thanks to this bitter/sweet pandemic and its gift of slowed time, the elements of my permaculture design are steadily emerging to seed the garden I'm after - one that leans in to Original Sustainability through the permaculture ethic of caring for creation, caring for people, and giving away surplus.

In the process, I truly am being re-synced, drawn in to the unity at the heart of creation, found only when we learn to live as FRIENDS - with God, people and all of nature.

Jerusalem Cross Gardening of Soul

An interesting observation is emerging. I'm discovering that nonviolence and its' practice - something I know I can become so much better at - drives this re-syncing process.

Two quotes by Dominic Crossan focus my thoughts.

Three varieties of blueberry bushes
planted above a row of terracing rocks

"...the historical Jesus lived and died for nonviolent resistance to the violent normalcy of civilization then embodied in first-century Mediterranean place and incarnated in first-century Roman time."

I note as I read this sentence today that nothing has changed. In spite of 2000 years of Christians following Jesus, we still have not learned he was, and is, nonviolent in his embodiment of the divine. Yet violence is still a normal part of our civilization today, both in how we relate to people and creation, but in a way that is dangerously more powerful.

Crossan continues. 

"We take upon ourselves nonviolent resistance against violence to move the trajectory of human evolution toward justice and peace rather than injustice and violence."

Gardening Can Shape this Trajectory

The chicken cage/tractor being
prepared for residents

The good news is nonviolent resistance is happening in my garden. In it I am learning to lean in to Original Sustainability and to join the loving dance of mutuality - yes, with backyard chickens [see previous blog entry] and fruit trees, and herbs, a small alfalfa field, insect breeder boxes, table scraps, and the Spirit ever pulling the life in my gardening system into itself even as it becomes incarnate in seed, shoot, bud, flower and fruit.

Conclusion

The simple act of gardening is restoring my soul. In a small but important way, it is helping to non-violently "move human evolution towards justice and peace" and away from "injustice and violence" particularly towards the earth. 

Weeping, seeding and weeding. It's all about how the Spirit seems to be moving in my life this season as Pentecost approaches. I am grateful to be doing Jerusalem-Cross-Gardening in my own back yard again. The parts of myself are reconnecting, gardening of soil eliciting the gardening of soul to weave contemplation and action into the Trinitarian dance that unites all in the unity of the One. 

Well-Being - From "Nest Egg" to Egg

Chickens! 

I closed out one of my small investment funds recently and invested in, yes, chickens. And the return they'll bring.

By this act, "nest egg" morphs into the promise of "eggs." And with it comes a shift in daily living - one more intentional and engaged with the wider mystery and gift of life at the center of which moves Christ.

Cold hard cash becomes living, breathing birds in a web of life; investment shifts from dollars banked (Economic Capital) to cultivating appropriate relationships with the fullness of the earth (Natural Capital). 

And it's in the relationship that the "return" will be found. The birds will be a part of a greater whole, as will I - a gardening system of multiple design elements into which we'll both fit, each playing our own unique life-giving and life-receiving roles.

The chicken condo arrives...

The multiple design elements?  A movable chicken cage/tractor system for housing the birds safely; the birds themselves (ideally an heirloom breed for hardiness and good egg productivity); insect breeder boxes (40 gallon porous barrels buried in the soil, and filled with moist mulch in which multiple insects and worms can thrive to be harvested as a protein supplement); a forest system of fruit trees (upper storey), alfalfa and herbs (ground storey) for fruit, forage and pest control; and swales on contour to harvest rainwater off a neighbors roof in order to optimize groundwater recharge to promote tree health and productivity. And, of course, me. I'll be one of the design elements too, playing a stewardship role of connecting the table (i.e. food scraps) with the chicken run, with the food forest, with the insect breeder box and ultimately back to the table (i.e. as eggs) in the endlessly regenerating cycle of life.

A cheque arrived in the mail last week as I closed out an investment account and reinvested it today in chickens. It wasn't a huge sum, but this return promises the added value of connection. I look forward to the arrival of the chicks, and investing myself in a reciprocal relationship of caring. Perhaps I'll finally learn my place, a small part in the endless circle-dance of life, death and resurrection.

Perhaps the world needs more backyard chickens to help us "get back to normal." And maybe, just maybe, they'll help usher in a new normal, not a return to the normalization of greed that has plundered the earth in which we've all been complicit.

It all begins, again, in the garden?