Journal of Sacred Work

I like to touch the earth and smell her fragrance when I pray.     -Jorie West, from Native American Poetry


   Sometimes, statistics can illuminate fundamental changes in our human condition. In the time of our grandparents and great grandparents, most Americans lived on farms. Just a century ago, 42% of Americans were employed in agricultural work. And this number largely ignores women and children.
   But much of the western world has now turned its back on farming. By the year 2000, less than 2% of Americans were working the land for a living. If we have lost touch with the earth, what does this mean?…

   Both of my grandfathers were born in the 19th century. I have wondered what it must have been like for them to be so dependent on animals for travel that their horses would have seemed as much members of the family as pets.
   But it’s our loss of contact with the land that I wonder about most. Our ancestors could not have envisioned a world were most of a modern working life would be lived inside a climate-controlled building in front of electric screens. And a home life that would be lived the same way.

   My father, born in 1905, spent his childhood playing along the Black River in northern Ohio near a farmhouse built by his grandfather, a Civil War veteran (my mother grew up near the Black River Falls, left, in another part of the community.) Dad trapped animals to sell the skins, built a cabin near the water with his brother, skinny-dipped in swimming holes. Along the way, he learned some of the tricks of living on the land: How to build a fire in the rain by carving wood from the dry undersides of fallen logs, how to keep his pant legs dry in wet grass by high-stepping (a funny sight, but practical.) And how to get a good night’s sleep on the ground by picking a place free of ant hills or trees with dead limbs. These knowings seem both quaint and useless for urbanites who survive and thrive with a different set of tricks. What my Dad taught me was that to know how to live outdoors, close to the earth, you have to listen to the voice of the land.
    Most human beings still live close to the earth in places we now refer to as "third world countries." It is from them, and from the original Americans who occupied this country, that we can still learn some of the wisdom of the earth.
    Here are four lines from a Navajo song:

The thoughts of the earth are my thoughts.
The voice of the earth is my voice.
All that belongs to the earth belongs to me.
All that surrounds the earth surrounds me.
It is lovely indeed, it is lovely indeed.

    During graveside services, ministers often use the lines, "earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust." If this means we came from the earth and that our bodies will return to it after we die, is it good for us to be so out of touch with it in our time between?

Spiritual Practice: This week, we can spend more time with the earth as she awakens to spring. Her voice is our voice.