Contemplating the Book of Nature

EarthAbbey member, Chris Hillman, is warden of Elsie Briggs House of Prayer in Bristol. The House is committed to exploring the contemplative tradition. As someone who has found increasing pleasure in being in nature, and also being delighted by some of the rich writings we have about the natural world, Chris has established a reading group to explore our relationship to the world we inhabit.

Over the two years we have been sharing thoughts and discussing books, we have come across some writings that speak in particular to the contemplative ways we are keen to follow. What these natural historians, nature writers and poets offer us is the gift of noticing, of paying attention, of being present. This key opens the door to a radical engagement, a being receptive to all that nature has to offer. It also opens up the possibility of being schooled into the wisdom of the Earth, with her patterns, her seasons, her lessons of vulnerability and yielding, her strength and resilience. We can look almost anywhere and learn.

What I have looked at time and time again is the bird’s nest. When I look at a bird’s nest I see such beauty and simplicity and such craft. I see also the paradox of security and precariousness. This touches me very deeply as I reflect on my own sense of security and my own precariousness. I am held by something or someone infinitely tender and I am invited to exercise trust and to accept my vulnerability.

Kathleen Jamie, author of Findings, calls herself a secular contemplative, and interestingly whilst her husband is seriously ill, she is asked to whom she prays. She reflects on this and offers as a response the idea that her noticing acutely the sunlight picking out the beauty of cobwebs under the gutter of her house has a quality of prayer about it. I am persuaded by this idea and would recommend this activity of paying attention. Another writer who deals in the trade of seeing is Annie Dillard. In her remarkable book, A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, she writes of an experience in which the beauty of the sunlight crossing the mountains in the distance transports her to a moment of mystical awareness. As she is spellbound by the vision in the distance she is also keenly aware of the action of stroking a puppy that adds to this experience.

Why does this contemplative attitude matter? Perhaps it offers the opportunity of noticing the beauty all round us in both the grand vision of the mountainside and the homely connection with an animal or pet. Seeing beauty leads naturally to a desire to cherish the world and to engage with it. The impact that human beings have on the natural world can often be destructive; with a contemplative vision we are open both to the beauty and the suffering of the world. With our eyes wide open we can see this more clearly and respond both passionately and imaginatively.

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