Jul 13 | CPE Journal #22: July 9th

The clock keeps ticking! I can’t believe that tomorrow there will only be two and a half weeks left…and not even that many, because I’m only on the unit two days in the last week.

Today one of my classmates shared a really beautiful worship service with some great quotes. Here was my favourite one:

“Religion is compared to a seed, not to a gem. Although it takes a great deal of time and endurance under high temperature and pressure for a gem to be made, not a sprout could come from it in a billion years.” (Seok Hun Ham, Korean Quaker)

There were many other stunning quotes but this one made me write this reflection:

A seed is so fragile. A gem is far more predictable. A gem is frozen once forged; a seed is always dynamic. Although it is small, it is far greater; although it is fragile, it is far stronger; although it is mortal, it is far closer to immortal. A seed is a gift that we cannot create ourselves. One seed gives rise to many, and in one seed we trace generations of plants and trees and everything that feeds from them. A gem gives nutrition to no-one.

It is therefore in fragility that we may find the greatest strength.

It made me also pair seeds with stars. Although stars are brilliant, they burn mortally and eventually die, but their material and particles infuse the whole universe with carbon – a source of life.

These quotes were so great I may slip more into further entries. For now I’ll close this one with the last prayer, from my soul-brother Thomas Merton:

“There is no leaf that is not in Your care. There is no cry that was not heard by You before it was uttered. There is no water in the shales that was not hidden there by Your wisdom. There is no concealed spring that was not concealed by You. There is no glen for a lone house that was not planned by You for a lone house. There is no [one] for that acre of woods that was not made by You for that acre of woods.

But there is a greater comfort in the substance of silence than in the answer to a question. Eternity is in the present. Eternity is in the palm of the hand. Eternity is a seed of fire whose sudden roots break barriers that keep my heart from being an abyss.”

Amen, beloved. Amen.

-Clarity