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A Single Tree
One of the things that my wife and I love is the “single trees” that fill the landscapes all over Switzerland. Here are a few in our village of Worb. This has made me wonder, beyond their beauty, what a single tree can teach us about our spirituality and relationship with God. A Single Tree Today, I stand in silence,And it prompts me to be still To be stillAnd hold onto my wordsTo be stillAnd resist the need to actTo be stillAnd reside within my name Rooted in Your creationI lose my statureI lose my fullnessI lose my looksThank You Rooted in Your creationI gain my statureI gain my fullnessI…
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Mt. Pilatus
We had a great time staying the night on top of Mt. Pilatus. (2132 meters (about 7000 ft.) above sea level.)
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Penetrating Light
Last week, during an early morning run, I was struck by the light that penetrated the darkness on one of my favorite trails near our house in Worb, Switzerland. It was a great reminder that as much as I try to hide from the light, the light always penetrates my shadows and invites me into freedom. Praised be you, my Lord, with all your creatures, especially Sir Brother Sun, who is the day and through whom you give us light. And he is beautiful and radiant with great splendour; and bears a likeness of you, Most High. –Canticle of the Creatures, St. Francis of Assisi (Laudato Si, 87)
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Summer at Seven
To approach the day as if the world depended on me to save it. To climb a tree with the intensity of someone on a mission. To ride my bike with a sense of great purpose and determination. And to run from here to there as if I were pursuing the evilest villain alive. Every day was a great adventure. It was an opportunity to live out the saga and storyline that I had imagined in my head. Every day was about being a seven-year-old boy created for something larger than himself. This was my summer at seven years old in Clifton Park, New York. I often fondly remember the…
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To Bless the Space Between
As we walked down to the train stop on Sunday morning, the clouds separated to allow the Bernese Alps to come into view. As I watched, I immediately thought of my Pastor from St. Ann in Phoenixville, PA, and his insight into being able to “Bless the Space Between” in our lives. I knew I had to find his insight this week from my notes, for the “space between” was becoming visible to me right there in my view. If only I could recognize the same “space between” with my wife and children every day. For this is my daily prayer… Here are some insights from Rev. John J. Newns’s…
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The Great Adventure
Oh, the cravings of adventure. On one level, our family is exactly two months into our new adventure living in Switzerland. Individually, my two boys are in the midst of the “great adventure” of their lives. Living here is part of this “great adventure” as boys. There is undoubtedly something to be said about boys’ need for adventure. It is engrained within us. From infancy, boys seem to crave kicking rocks down the road, climbing trees, running instead of walking, and/or making anything into a weapon. “Men are often aggressive. They seem to have an inborn need to fight, to put themselves in conflict with the outer world in order to…
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Seeing the Beautiful
On the one hand, they say, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” On the other hand, beauty is not as subjective as it seems. Maybe beauty is more about the ability to see or not. In other words, beauty is everywhere and in everything. My ability to recognize this in my life is somehow connected to joy. This makes me think then, what helps me to see? Switzerland is beautiful beyond words. The landscapes and mountains are indescribable—so much so that pictures do not do them justice. One result of witnessing this kind of beauty is that it captivates you, draws you in, and then sends you out…
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Thun, Switzerland
