Autumnal Equinox & Terra Divina
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| Leaves from common mullein, garden sage, nasturtiums, zinnia, anise hyssop, spoon tomatoes. The words on the rocks are wander, listen, respond, release. |
Earlier this year, I started a series of events or gatherings through my church, for the purpose of exploring contemplative and creative spiritual practices called Tending to the Sacred. I haven't ended up having as many so far as I originally meant to. I did one in May with some nature practices, and a few weeks later, Pastor Sherrie did one on contemplative photography. And then I had vacation and various other things happened, and I got no more planned for the summer. But all along I knew I wanted to do Terra Divina as an ongoing practice, in addition to the various one-off gatherings. So I'm very pleased that I finally did it.
Here is a video I made to post on social media. I used my own photos and video clips, except for the one with that shadow of the arm, which is a free stock photo from pexels by Fidan Nadim qizi. I made the video in Canva.
Terra Divina is like the practice of lectio divina, a method of reading scripture. In terra divina, we are "reading" the landscape. There are four steps:
Wander - wander, taking in with all of your senses, allowing your attention to be caught
Our Gathering
We made a circle on the lawn at Indian Creek Nature Center. It was a little warm and windy. I assembled the plant mandala pictured above on top of a wooden crate, and it served as a centerpiece (in a cold season, we might have a fire). The rocks in the mandala helped to keep the lightweight plant materials from blowing away.
We met on the day of the autumnal equinox, so we took some time to consider the transitioning season, and our own life's season. Then, I talked us through the practice of terra divina, and everyone set off to practice individually for about 35 minutes.
We came back to the circle and shared about our experiences with the practice. By this time, the air was a bit cooler and the sun had noticably changed position. I brought tulsi tea and a loaf of rustic bread to share, and butter, too. I said that the bread was to remind us that creation nourishes us.
When you are leading, it can be hard to experience something in the same way as a participant, but I did try to do a version of terra divina myself. I did not wander off, because I was staying close to our circle to watch our things. But within that limited area, I did find my attention was caught by this small Partridge Pea plant on the edge of the prairie.
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| Partridge Pea in the prairie |
It probably caught my attention because I know this plant pretty well. Did you notice it has the same name as my blog? Partridge Pea was the first plant I identified when I first started to teach myself native plant identification about 10 years ago. I started that journey when we lived in the country, and I'd go walking on the B roads to seek out any flower I could find. Partridge Pea likes to grow in disturbed soils, just like where I found it on the eroded edges of a dirt road. I've seen them quite robust in those locations--sometimes over three feet tall in large groups, loaded with yellow flowers.
But this one here on the edge of the prairie was just a little thing. Modest. Spindly. Less than a foot tall. Surrounded by thick grasses.
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