Of handwipes and hallelujahs...

I am beginning to feel like an alien in my world... the only living human being who doesn’t routinely use sanitizing hand wipes on her shopping cart. From Sam’s to Ingle’s to Bed Bath and Beyond (I”ve always wondered where beyond was in that name), there are dispensers at the door of sanitizing wipes for your hands and the carts. Grizzled old timers and young trend setters alike stop to conscientiously wipe themselves down, free themselves from germs before they enter the hallowed germ free halls of shopping.
I know, I know... I hear the nurses and doctors reciting the statistics of germs passed along on our hands, flu and other nasty bugs we can pick up on those shopping carts. But the truth of the matter is we are surrounded by germs everywhere. Sometimes I think it was God’s way of making sure our immune systems developed as they should. And other days, I admire the marketing ploy that has convinced us to buy all these little plastic canisters full of individual wipes to preserve our health. What happened to soap and water and common sense? Just because it is new and improved doesn’t mean it is better and worth it.
The real reason it bothers me so, though, is the implications of this cleanliness ritual. We no longer seem to trust our world, its ability to nurture us, to care for us, to provide what is needed. Our bodies have become not temples for God’s spirit but fortresses to be defended with hand wipes. Our companions in Sam’s are not neighbors but potential sources of illness and disease. Those who don’t step up to the plate, or the wipe dispenser, are viewed with disdain.
Somehow we humans can take a perfectly good creation and ruin it with overuse. Antibiotics... literally a life saver... we use them too much and suddenly the germs they destroy adapt and are immune to its effects. Immunizations... again life saving possibilities until we begin giving all newborns a plethora of shots for diseases before they leave the hospital. Food... once a delight and a pleasure, is now seen as a controlled substance. You can’t eat too much or too much sugar or too much fat. Food became fast, we slowed down and we became fat. It wasn’t the food’s fault.
God created this world and pronounced it good. We have forgotten that, I think, because we have isolated ourselves from this world. Sitting in air conditioned houses with all our windows closed, riding in air conditioned cars with our windows rolled up, riding through our neighborhoods instead of walking, buying food that we did not grow from countries far away, avoiding the eyes of those we pass by, living in places where ambient light wipes out starlight. We have forgotten how to walk barefooted on the Ground of our Being and we are the poorer for it.
So I will continue to pass up the hand wipes so generously offered and take my chances. I will celebrate the world around me as a good and precious gift not as a field of germs and death. I will eat with a grateful heart and grow as much of my food as I can. I will be sensible about my health but not obsessed with protecting my body. It is a temporary creation anyway. I will remember that God created this world good and so it is... good and beautiful and bountiful. And I will give thanks for all who share this blue space jewel with me whether they sanitize their hands or not. They are my neighbors and as I love God, so do I love them. Now if you all will excuse me, I am going to go play in the dirt a little while and sing hallelujahs while I pick bugs off my potato plants, pull weeds in my flower beds, muck the stalls and swat flies. Have a lovely day in this world of ours... germs and all.

Of Roses and Rainbows...

It has been a sad week in many ways. Walking down to the stable last night to put the horses and donkeys to bed, my soul was dragging. A friend has died from cancer and another friend is waiting for test results that could be bad news. In BCD days (Before Celeste Died), I would have called Celeste and asked her to pray with me for these friends. We had an agreement that allowed us to call, ask for prayer and know that we were heard and loved as we prayed for each other and those we loved.
Prayer, believing in the power of prayer, is like sex in the olden days. Everybody wants to know about it but no one wants to own up to actually doing it. God forbid we should desert our belief in the rational long enough to let the irrational sneak into our daily lives. Pastor Pat used a quote from Wendell Berry Sunday morning in her sermon that nailed this double standard. A paraphrase... We stumble and quibble over the miracles in the New Testament like turning the water into wine but ignore the miracles that surround us everyday like seeds that lie underground, grow towards the light, are watered with rain and produce food. Miracles abound and we take them for granted in their “dailyness”.
I have for years believed in prayer for no good reason at all except I believe in a loving God. In my belief system, love is balanced between “just because” and “just do it”...passive and active. God loves me just because I am and because I am, I love God and love my neighbors. Prayer is the verbal and non-verbal expression of faith and belief that a God of Love will hear my heart, will care about my needs, and will answer one way or another. Sometimes there is no answer and sometimes there are no answers for what happens in this imperfect world. Children shouldn’t die before their parents from cancer or starvation. Good people shouldn’t have to bear the same burdens as those who serve themselves without consideration for others. Life is not fair and God knows that. Nevertheless, sometimes there are answers to prayer for those who have eyes to see and ears to hear.
For years I have found evidence of God’s answers to my prayers in strange ways. In my darkest times, God shows up in rainbows, roses, the faces of small children laughing, old mountains worn smooth by generations of time, sunsets and sunrises. Last night as I walked to the stable, Michael called from the deck, “Look up, Peggy!” And there it was... a double rainbow. Beautiful, bright, fleeting assurance that God is still in covenant with us, still present in our times of trouble, and all will be well even when all is not well. I walk to my front door where I have planted roses in memory of Celeste, breathe in their sweet fragrance and give thanks for all the gifts of love that have come my way. Most of all, I am grateful for my tears, a leaking heart, that connects me to the Heart of God that is broken for us all everyday. Thanks be to God for laughter and tears, love and light, rainbows and roses, life and death. It is all good.