10/05/2026
On Sunday, Jana-Lyn led us through a meditation on the glory contained in the common onion.
We began our work from the idea that:
“The heavens declare the glory of God.”
Psalm 19:1
Then we got out our cutting boards and paring knives and went to town on two big bags of red onions, sherpaed by the words of Robert Farrar Capon from The Supper of the Lamb: A Culinary Reflection as we made our way toward the top of Mount Onion.
Capon’s invitation is to really pay attention to an onion. Not immediately turn it into a symbol, or ask what it can teach us, but encounter the thing itself. Its skin. Its layers. Its moisture. Its smell. To meet it, in Capon’s words, with “astonishment at their great glory.”
For Capon, this kind of attention is deeply theological. The world is full of things that exist because God delights in them. The work of being human is, at least in part, to notice them, receive them, and love them for what they are.
Or, as Capon eventually puts it: "[God] likes onions, therefore they are.”
Yes, it was weird.
Yes, there were moments of, “Where is all of this going?”
But it was also transcendent to be in the same room paying attention together. Making discoveries about ourselves, about the life we share this planet with, and about the good God who created it all.
Sometimes the heavens declare the glory of God.
Sometimes you just need to spend quality time with an onion.
