The tree across the street

As the furnace man was leaving the house today we started to talk about the weather, and the cloudy day today as contrasted with the last few days of sunny weather. He asked me if I got to enjoy the fall color of trees last Sunday. I was dubious in my response because I thought he was asking me if I had gone anywhere last Sunday which was a beautiful fall day. I had not gone anywhere to take in the fall color. As he started to describe the beautiful fall colors he had enjoyed Sunday I remembered that I was working in front of the house on Sunday and noticed the beauty of a tree across the street. Since we were talking in our driveway I looked up and saw the tree was still full of color. I guess you can travel to find fall color or just look up.

Finding beauty where you are by looking deeply is something I found in both the lives of Mahatma Gandhi and St. Ignatius of Loyola. For a presentation at the recent Peace and Justice Studies Conference here in Milwaukee I had written an imaginary conversation between these two great persons, the founder of the Society of Jesus and the father of India. Today I put the conversation on the Nonviolent Cow at Conversation between Mahatma Gandhi and St. Ignatius of Loyola on Nonviolence and Sustainability.

Although both men live in different times and different cultures they both excelled in “finding God in all things” to use a phrase applied to the spirituality of St. Ignatius. Both persons lived in the present and would have seen the beauty of the tree across the street.

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