Earlier this month my wife and I spent a few days in the Shenandoah National Park. It was stunningly beautiful, the weather was great, the animals untroubled by our presence. We got a little lost taking a shortcut on the Appalachian trail, but these are the misadventures we laugh about, now. Perhaps we were being beckoned to a longer hike.
It was an escape; it was also a gift
Sometimes, we remember how important it can be for us to step away, from a problem, a persistent worry, or perhaps from the domination and division of our national election.
Retreats, stepping back, have a long spiritual history. They can remind us that we live in a bigger world and are not alone, that our concerns need to be attended to, but not allowed to consume us. In fact, when we can find ways to be refreshed and refilled, we can step back into our life with greater resolve rather than fears.
On a moonless night in the Shenandoah National Park, one of the darkest places on the East Coast, the stars are brilliant and fill the sky. The Milky Way, like a great cloud or wave reaches across the sky and invariably reminds me of the words of the psalmist “when I consider the heavens, the work of your hands, the moon and the stars you set in place, what is humankind that you are mindful of them, that you care for them?” Perhaps it is the stars that still give us our true bearings.
But because of artificial lights that brighten the skies, some 80% of Americans can’t see the Milky Way from where they live. I hadn’t known that. It raises the question of how it impacts us not to be surrounded so clearly by a sense of wonder. For when we see it, it still invites gratitude to God and a greater sense of the gift of the life we each have been given.
