We paused on the trail—tired, hot, and momentarily liberated from the weight of our heavy packs—and I sat down on a scorched, fallen log, grateful for the respite, in what only three years earlier had been a verdant, old growth Montana forest. Now, the charred remains of spruce, lodge-pole pine, and fir were all that I could see. Burned sentinels of formerly majestic trees rose ahead and above us, and those no longer standing seemed to litter the forest floor as if some great force had arbitrarily tossed them and let them lay where they fell. Chaos and destruction seemed all around. I found myself feeling sad, and lamenting the loss of what I knew had once been a fecund, flourishing forest ecosystem.
I was in the Scapegoat Wilderness area of Montana with dear friends from graduate school, an annual, much-anticipated sojourn, and this was not what I had in mind when I flew into Great Falls a few days before. I’d had visions of escaping my native southern heat by hiking in cool, pristine sub-alpine forests, and I now found myself in a forest radically changed by fire; ravaged, and permanently damaged. Or was it? Was I seeing the whole picture? We live in a complex world that is always changing, and the response of any “system,” whether a family, a business (or an economy), a church in a season of change as we are currently experiencing—or an ecosystem, to the shocks and disturbances of change, depends on a number of factors. But what are they, and how do we understand change (and its subtler iteration, transition) and resilience in response to them?
After several miles of hiking on this hot day, we stopped for water and rest on a trail still ensconced in the burn. As we sat, quietly, I began to look around. Amidst the desolation, I began to see that life was everywhere, pushing upward in infinite detail, where my vision had been limited only to what was most obvious to the eye. I caught a glimpse of a mule-deer, drawn to the open terrain by the lush, waist-high vegetation now growing in the sunlight. Light, life-giving and fierce, seemed to have given birth to the life hidden in the trees, and in the soil, all along. Fireweed, a lovely plant, with lavender and pink flowers, that grows in just such burned-over land, was everywhere round us. How had I missed it?
As I listened, and watched, and finally began to pay attention, I heard a low, buzzing hum, and then began to see that the fireweed had attracted hundreds of hummingbirds, dodging and darting, feeding on the fireweed nectar, along with bees and other insects. Birds, marmots, chipmunks, wildlife of all kinds seemed suddenly visible, where before I had seen only blackened trees and desolation. Life seemed to be flourishing where once there I had seen only death, and destruction. And I had not seen it, in part because I had not paid attention to the moment—and to the larger, more complex picture it contained. Focusing only on the blackened trees straight ahead and above me, and on my fear of the fires to the north, fears stirred by the landscape all around me, I failed to see the profusion of life flourishing right beneath my feet. Seeds of lodge-pole pines, needing only the intense heat of the fire to release their inner Chi—the deepest, essential life breath and energy, and I had both literally and metaphorically not seen the emerging new forest for the desolate, burned trees. To contend with high-impact fire, lodge-pole pine produce cones that open following exposure to extreme heat (termed ‘serotiny’). This serotinous strategy is one piece of evidence that fire was historically a prevalent disturbance across the lodge-pole pine ecosystems of the Rocky Mountains. And, though trees are the big players in forests, understory species (like grasses and shrubs) also have a strong evolutionary relationship with fire. Following fire, areas dominated by sprouting species (aspen, cottonwood, oak, many grasses, and many shrubs) tend to rapidly return to pre-fire conditions. These species, many of which were previously rare or absent, flourish under the new conditions. Indeed, flourishing was everywhere, in stark contrast to the all too evident reminders of what had been, on the surface, a very challenging time for this forest ecosystem.
This is how change becomes transition, through resilience, as we adapt to the inevitable changes in our lives. Mary Oliver hints at this in a recent poem, which captures well the ambiguous, sacred mystery of the spaces between us, and the ongoing, emergent fluidity of creation.
Mysteries, Yes
Truly, we live with mysteries too marvelous
to be understood.
How grass can be nourishing in the
mouths of the lambs.
How rivers and stones are forever
in allegiance with gravity
while we ourselves dream of rising.
How two hands touch and the bonds
will never be broken.
how people come, from delight or the
scars of damage,
to the comfort of a poem.
Let me keep my distance, always, from those
who think they have the answers.
Let me keep company always with those who say
“Look!” and laugh in astonishment,
and bow their heads.(Mary Oliver~Evidence)
At Holy Family we, too, are in a time of transition. Recently we celebrated Pentecost with a wonderful service, followed by a bountiful potluck meal and old-fashioned hymn-sing in the conference center. A deep bow of gratitude to all who made this wonderful day possible! The Holy Ghost Fire of Pentecost is with us during this season of transition at Holy Family too, as we undergo transition. And as evidenced by our creative responses to this process, resilience and imagination are the fruits of a spirit of compassionate collaboration with the Spirit in Her wisdom, and a living into deep mystery of who we are, and who we are becoming as a parish.
On our Montana sojourn, I found a measure of resilience—or the tentative beginning of it—in a scorched, desolate forest already in transition, a coming back to life signified by an imaginative, creative flourishing beyond expectation. Just this past summer, I found myself running along a trail in northern Colorado, the site of which had experienced a fierce fire in 1994. Now, life flourished in shadows of the former trees, some still standing in testimony to the former conflagration. There, as I ran upward, toward the Mummy Range, some 18 years after the fire, the aspen, fir, lodge-pole pine and, yes, fireweed bore testimony to a deep, abiding resilience at the heart of things. I was filled with gratitude, and with hope. Last Sunday at Holy Family as I looked around at those worshiping in the nave of our beautiful sanctuary, doves flying above us, our amazing choir singing so well, all working in synchrony, I was deeply grateful. And later, I saw the tears of those who sang once again the old hymns of childhood, and I saw the seeds of resilience, hope, and, yes, new life as the Spirit moved among us. Thanks be to God, and thank you, to each of you in this season of hope and resilience at our beloved Holy Family.
