Listen: Week 2, Day 2

“What a thing it is to sit absolutely alone, in the forests, at night, cherished by this wonderful, unintelligible, perfectly innocent speech, the most comforting speech in the world, the talk that rain makes by itself all over the bridges, and the talk of the water courses everywhere in the hollows! Nobody started it, nobody is going to stop it. It will talk as long as it wants, this rain. As long as it talks I am going to listen.”       —Thomas Merton

What a notion–that we might be cherished, somehow valued, by the very earth that we systematically destroy. In the midst of all our running and doing, we might remember that we are a part of nature’s greater discourse. Listening to that voice–the true “voice in the wilderness–” might make us more mindful, more humble, more grateful…and ultimately, more equipped to welcome the new life and love that is coming to dwell in flesh among us.