Journal of Sacred Work

Art’s eyes see deeper. You’ve got to look for more than a few seconds. Most people don’t…too scary for them.    -Alex Judice in the play Who Loves Judas? by Dane Dakota   

   The sacred can be found anywhere because sacredness is not determined by the thing viewed, but by the observer. I try to make this point all the time and I honestly think that most people have difficulty with the idea.
   Caregivers have special opportunities to observe the sacred each day and night. This requires that we look with the heart’s eyes, not with the heads. It is the heart which interprets what the eyes see and the ears hear…

   In the film, A Place Called Alive, a documentary we recently completed on Nashville’s Alive Hospice, Ms. Ann Morrow, a ninety-year old woman dying of cancer sings her favorite hymn a Capella. Her voice is reedy and slides off key. A music teacher analyzing the performance by typical standards would award an "F."
   Yet the heart’s ears hear differently. The heart knows Ms. Morrow’s rendition holds transcendent beauty.
   There is something or someone sacred nearby you at this moment. Where is it? Who is it?
   My favorite example of beauty in the ordinary is the Subway wrapper I have tacked to my wall. I’ve used this illustration before because it seems so odd to most people. How can a functional thing, a plastic bag, be beautiful, much less sacred?  After it’s used, it typically becomes trash to be discarded.
   But what if trash is saved, mounted and framed? Framing is supposed to be reserved for those objects we regard as typically beautiful. Landscapes, angels, nudes, flowers, portraits – these are the things people have been accustomed to framing. Subway bags? It took Andy Warhol and other artists to teach us that beauty can be found anywhere – even in a soup can label.
   The great Abraham Maslow wrote that "the great lesson is that the
sacred is in the ordinary, that it is to be found in one’s daily life, in one’s
neighbors, friends, and family, in one’s backyard."    
   Have we yet learned this lesson?
   Sacredness is created by what we bring to the encounter.  Invite Love to join you on your next encounter and you will see what beauty Love can bring.

-Erie Chapman