April 2021 E-News

Getting Our Hands Dirty

Our job is to do our job in God’s great movement of love in this world.

—Bishop Michael Curry, Love is the Way

Greetings!

Spring is a time when a lot of us are outside “getting our hands dirty” like Miss Rumphius, the title character of my favorite childhood book by Barbara Cooney. It is a profoundly meaningful and beautiful story about a girl named Alice.

In the book, young Alice (Miss Rumphius) sets out to do the three things she told her grandfather she would do: One, travel to faraway places. Two, live by the sea. And most importantly, three, make the world more beautiful.

She travels the world, befriending the Bapa Raja on a tropical island and climbing tall mountains where the snow never melts. But after hurting her back while dismounting a camel, she decides it is time to settle by the sea.

As Miss Rumphius convalesces in her seaside cottage, she wonders what she’ll do to make the world more beautiful. Looking out the window one summer day at the beautiful lupine flowers, she realizes what she must do—she must sow lupine seeds up and down the hillsides and roadsides to spread the beauty of the “blue and purple and rose-colored” flowers throughout her community.

In real life, we don’t make the world more beautiful just once. Maybe we made the world more beautiful last year, five years ago, or forty years ago, but what about today? There are so many ways to make the world more beautiful no matter our circumstances—we don't always have to literally "get our hands dirty." But, we do have to keep discerning each day, each year, each decade how we will engage with and contribute to our world.

In recent weeks, my kids and I have been busy digging in the dirt, planting trees and flowers and spreading mulch. In my own way, I feel as though this is a small act of making the world more beautiful. The freshly planted trees are exhaling new oxygen, the landscaping looks nice, and my children are outside, learning to help, and becoming stronger little people.

But the words of Miss Rumphius still echo in my head. "You must do something to make the world more beautiful."

All right, I say. But I do not know yet what that can be.

Becca Perry-Hill

Becca Perry-Hill is the Outreach Manager for Lumunos. She lives with her family on a mini-farm in Brevard, NC. She can be reached at becca@lumunos.org.

Blowing in the Wind

Reaching ten feet high, bursting with hundreds of sunny blooms, my forsythia never looked so good! But five years ago, this was a different story.

It started small, nothing exceptional, just a few skinny branches, no buds. I found the perfect spot, mulched in spring and fall and let the rain do most of the watering. Much of the year I ignored it with little more than a sideways glance to see if my new shrub was still standing. Forsythias are strong they say. Easy to grow.

The second year was much like the first. So on it went, year after disappointing year. Naked branches, no buds. Enough! I’ve had enough! I want flowers! So I went to a garden center, bought special fertilizer and watched a youtube video on “Forsythia Rejuvenation.”

One year later, my forsythia is the talk of the neighborhood. Not exactly, but my neighbor loves the yellow splash of spring she sees outside her kitchen window.

All it took was dogged determination, a youtube video and a very sharp pair of pruning shears. This was my "Aha" moment—my harbinger for change. If I want to see a better world I have to dig deeper, “get my hands dirty.”

Doing the minimum is not an option for me. Doing what’s predictable no longer works. Sometimes I have to break open the box, dump out what’s inside, and start over.

Like helping people living on the fringe. Giving away new clothes instead of old ones, or buying some more bananas and a loaf of bread for a man holding up a sign telling anyone who sees him that he’s hungry.

Blowing seeds into the wind. Some ideas will fall away. Some will take root, and some will bloom like crazy!

Alice Barbera

Reflection Question

What seeds have you planted, making the world a little more beautiful?

One More Reason to Donate...

In 2021, the government has made it more attractive

for all people to make charitable donations:

Individual taxpayers who don't itemize can again take advantage of a $300 deduction for charitable donations. That increases to $600 for couples who file jointly. For those who do itemize, there are additional big changes designed to incentivize giving. (Check with your tax advisor to see if that applies to you.)