The Restory Retreat Centre

    Glad To Meet You, Trees! The evergreen oak at the entrance to our lane  ~ ❖ ~ “I frequently tramped eight or ten miles through the deepest snow to keep an appointment with a beech-tree, or a yellow birch, or an old acquaintance among the pines.”                                                                   Henry David Thoreau ~ ❖ ~ The Conversation Elements From The Conversation Poplars lining up towards Tafelkop  ~ ❖ ~ "Silence my soul,  these trees are prayers."                                           Rabindranath Tagore ~ ❖ ~ Music Psithurism -  a rustling or whispering sound, such as leaves in the wind   What is beautiful about Eva Cassidy's  Tall Trees In Georgia...

Jerusalem Nowhere is there more prayer. The Nuns at the Holy Sepulchre. The faithful at Al Aqsa Mosque. The worshippers at the Wall. The call to prayer at dawn and dusk Warbling from the citadels. The church bells, The Persian trills, The passion spilled over texts From every major/minor religious sect. Nowhere is there more prayer than Jerusalem, Thanks be to God, Hamdilala, Baruch Hashem. And yet, I'm starting to think that it's You and not them, God, what's the point of prayer? If there's nowhere where There's more prayer, And terror reigns Then, Who's to blame? If suddenly, without a whisper goodbye, Jesus, Allah, Adonai, The three men they admire most All took the last train for the coast, And the Moslems got up from their knees And the Christians put down their rosaries And the Jews stayed their hands from kissing Their mezuzahs, And everyone looked up, And realized something's missing... God is missing. Stop ...

Peter Paul Rubens, The Descent from the Cross, 1612 -1614 Thus the overflow from things pours into you. Just as a fountain’s higher basins spill down like strands of loosened hair into the lowest vessel, so streams the fullness into you, when things and thoughts cannot contain it                                                                                Rainer Maria Rilke, The Book of Hours II, 10 ~ U weet dat ek nie die kruis verstaan nie. As ek doodeerlik moet wees, dan moet ek sê dat ek nie ten volle begryp wie Jesus regtig was of wat die implikasies van sy koms w...

Jasper, the Border Collie, at the river Photograph by George Angus You are the giver of all good things. All good things are sent from heaven above, rain and sun, day and night, justice and righteousness, bread to the eater and seed to the sower, peace to the old, energy to the young, joy to the babes. We are takers, who take from you, day by day, daily bread, taking all we need as you supply, taking in gratitude and wonder and joy. And then taking more, taking more than we need, taking more than you give us, taking from our sisters and brothers, taking from the poor and the weak, taking because we are frightened, and so greedy, taking because we are anxious, and so fearful, taking because we are driven, and so uncaring. Give us peace beyond our fear, and so end our greed. Give us well-being beyond our anxiety, and so end our fear. Give us abundance beyond our drivenness, and so end our uncaring. Turn our taking into giving … since we are in your giving image: Make us giving like y...

My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going. I do not see the road ahead of me. I cannot know for certain where it will end. Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so. But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you. And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing. I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire. And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death. I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone.”                                                                           ...

Photograph  by Troy Mayr Sit and be still until in the time of no rain you hear beneath the dry wind's commotion in the trees the sound of flowing water among the rocks, a stream unheard before, and you are where breathing is prayer.                             Wendell Berry

Kry wolke seer? (Met apologie aan Hildegard Knef) Wie blaas die winde op hul baan? Kan oseane ook gaan staan? Wie knoop die sterre tot ‘n kruis? Sal skulpe elders anders ruis? Kry wolke seer wat skielik val? Het hobbelperdjies ook ‘n stal? Wie knip die kleed vir Tafelberg? Kan vredesduifies hul vererg? Kan eendagmooi ook langer hou? Trou jakkals wél met wolf se vrou? Wat is dit wat die mantis bid? Kan slange knak en regop sit? Ek is nie meer ‘n kindjie klein, want vragies hou my hart onrein en neem van my die amen-sê waarin ons rus en vrede lê.                                                      Hennie Aucamp: Teen Latenstyd

Photograph by Michael Kenna “The discipline of the heart makes us stand in the presence of God with all we have and are; our fears and anxieties, our guilt and shame, our sexual fantasies, our greed and anger, our joys, successes, aspirations and hopes, our reflections, dreams and mental wanderings, and most of all our people, family, friends and enemies – in short all that makes us who we are… We tend to present to God only those parts of ourselves with which we feel relatively comfortable and which we think will invoke a positive response. Thus our prayer becomes very selective, narrow and unbalanced. And not just our prayer, but also our self-knowledge, because by behaving as strangers before God we become strangers to ourselves.”                                                                      ...

By the pie ces announcing themselves lately, I get the feeling that I’m thinking a lot about prayer: how we use and abuse it, what it says about our view of God and ourselves, our image of piety. Something else that’s trotting along for some time now stems from a remark made by J.W. Krutch on the writing of Henry David Thoreau that I read a while ago: “His humor was, on the other hand, part of his philosophy. He meant his jokes and was never more serious than when he was being funny.” Have you heard this one? An overweight man went on a diet. He was so serious about it that he even changed the route he used to follow going to work- it no longer passed the bakery. Then, one morning, to the astonishment and dismay of his supporting colleagues, he walked into the office with the most delicious coffee cake. However, all their scolding could not wipe the heavenly expression from his face. He simply said: “This is a very special cake. I accidentally drove by the bakery this ...

Throw away all your begging bowls at God’s door, For I have heard the Beloved prefers sweet threatening shouts, Something on the order of: “Hey Beloved, My heart is a raging volcano Of love for you! You better start kissing me - Or Else!” Hafiz

We arrange our lives as best we can, to keep your holiness at bay, with our pieties, our doctrines, our liturgies, our moralities, our secret ideologies, Safe, virtuous, settled. And then you – you and your dreams you and your visions, you and your purposes, you and your commands, you and our neighbors. We find your holiness not at bay, but probing, pervading, insisting, demanding. And we yield, sometimes gladly, sometimes resentfully, sometimes late …. or soon. We yield because you, beyond us, are our God. We are your creatures met by your holiness, by your holiness made our true selves. And we yield. Amen                                                       ...