theology of dirt

The kiss of the sun for pardon, 
The song of the birds for mirth, 
One is nearer God's Heart in a garden 
Than anywhere else on earth.

Dorothy Frances Gurney (1858 - 1932)

The day lilies are a good four or five inches above the soil.  This is usually the time of year when I start planting sweet peas.  But I won't let myself plant anything, note, anything until I clean up the garden first from winter rain devastation.  I wonder, is transplanting things classified as planting or clean up?  Because I would like to transplant the prolific day lilies into new place on the Feast of St. Joseph.  So fitting.

I think I will get a statue of St. Joseph and put him in among the day lilies.  Mary sits in her white and blue garden that has strawberries in it.  St. Francis holds the bird bath.  The girl praying the Angelus sits among the roses.  I am very happy working in my garden.  It could be that I am soaking up the vitamin D, it could be the endorphins released from physical activity.  Part of my joy is that my children are out with me, asking me dozens of questions while I work, they know a lot about flowers and Life from helping me in the dirt.

They whiz about me sometimes on roller blades, on bikes, on ride me toys.  They pester me for drinks and snacks and picnics and want me to find fishing worms in the grass.  They beg me to work in the garden.  The big girls lay on blankets and read their novels and sometimes do their schoolwork lying on their bellies.

Part of my joy in the garden comes from the analogy of sowing seeds and Sowing Seeds.   I see a vivid analogy; teaching love of God's good brown dirt and love of God and the life we look to and strive for in the hereafter.

The dirt is like the body.  We can respect and uphold it, care for it.  Draw out of it its innate beauty.  Or it can be abused and neglected.

The temple and holy ground.

We toil, nurture, water, weed.  It is hard work and sometimes it hurts, but just like bringing life into the world, when we stand looking at the product of our labour...praise Him who created the heavens and the earth.

God made all things of beauty, I am his tool.  In my garden, in the manor, in my vocation.  When I see the majesty of the garden, my garden, any garden I stand in wonder  at the Maker who could make something so beautiful and offer us something infinitely more so.

How can it be?  St. Joseph, pray for the protection families and their purity!