10/25/2024
Changing Leaves
As a Californian, I was not accustomed to seeing much color on the trees in autumn. Fall was simply a cooler version of summer, with some wind and rain. Yes, the leaves fell off the trees, but not with the dramatic changes of color seen in New England. Last year my brother and sister-in-law flew across the country at the beginning of October, and I took some days off to drive with them through Vermont, to Lake Placid, New York, then back through Vermont and New Hampshire, before returning to Boston. Although the colors were not as brilliant as they would soon be, for us they were spectacular: a diminishing number of leaves were still green, many turned bright yellow, others red, purple or brown.
What do colorful leaves teach us about our lives? Each of us is like a leaf on a tree. We bud and grow in the early years of our lives, we become full and green in our young adulthood and middle age, in our mature years we become colorful with the wisdom we have accumulated throughout our lives, in old age we begin to lose our mental abilities and physical capacities and become like brown leaves waiting to be severed from the tree. That may seem like a tragic story, but our Christian faith has quite a different perspective: So we do not lose heart. Though our outer nature is wasting away, our inner nature is being renewed every day. For this slight momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, because we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen; for the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal (2 Cor 4:16-18). We see the tree with its changing leaves that eventually fall; we see that people sooner or later breathe their last and depart this life, but we don’t see what their souls become in the next life.
St. Joseph Retreat House in the course of the year receives a great variety of guests seeking a few days of peace to pray and deepen their relationship with God. Some are young adults, some middle-aged, some of a mature age; men and women, married or single, young people discerning a vocation, seminarians, religious sisters and brothers, priests; most are Catholics, but some are from different Christian denominations. Each person is unique, and all are at a particular moment in their life’s journey. From the point of view of the retreat house staff, they are like the many beautiful leaves on various trees in the fall, each possessing its own color and shape. God, our Creator, waits for each retreatant to come away and rest for a few days, laying aside the busy activities of life so as to give full attention to Him. Through specially chosen Scripture passages He speaks to each soul, usually quietly, as God once spoke to the prophet Elijah with a still small voice (1 Kgs 19:12). Having heard the Word of God, the retreatant is moved to respond to His loving call, to continue being renewed in one’s inner nature.
As St. Ignatius asserts at the beginning his Spiritual Exercises, we are each created to praise, reverence and serve God our Lord, and by this means to save our souls (Principle and Foundation). In all the seasons of our lives, that is God’s call to us: to make Him the center of our lives, and to use our particular gifts to serve Him in our brothers and sisters. Do you want to deepen your love of God and neighbor? A time of quiet prayer with spiritual guidance can help.
Fr. Craig MacMahon, OMV
