Religion, Nature and Environment Class papers

Religion and Ecology Project:
Ben and Mark's Tree Adventure
K. Mark Demma

I had been at a complete loss as what to do for the final project for the religion and ecology class and the sessions that we had to try to decide what we where going to do did not really seem to help much. In all the hectic running around these last few weeks, I think that getting into a spiritual frame of mind was the last thing on my mind. So it is interesting to note how I did not seem to actively seek the project as much as it found me. I want to unfold this story and the little adventure that it took me.

We had determined in our group that I was going to use the digital camera to take some photos of some of the areas of the college land in order to get a visual sense of what was being done by the college on these lands. My approach was very much one of "I have to get this project done" and I was not really thinking of spirituality or religion at all quite frankly, but rather seeing it as yet another task in my seemingly endless list of things that I needed to get done in the hectic end of the year rush.

Ben and I met at the appointed time and prepared to set off to the wilds of Jones Mountain. Ben works on the natural resources crew and it is his crews job to maintain the land that the college owns. On the way to the mountain, Ben related to me that he as well was having a difficult time relating spirituality to the project or his job on the natural resources crew. [We now enter Mark's mind...] .o0 "Oh great, if Ben is having trouble with this, then I really must be sunk. Oh well, we just need to get this over with. Lets just get some pictures and then I can run off to ...." We got to the mountain and I asked Ben to point out something interesting to shoot. [Marks mind...] .o0 "OK, lets this over with, stop blabbering about the damn trees Ben, I just want to get this over with, do you know how much stuff I have to do?" Ben started talking about how they take care of the trees and here I was surrounded by all this natural beauty and some how was oblivious to it all. But soon I found myself calming down from the hectic frenzy that I had put myself into and was starting to become effected by the surroundings and the natural beauty that was all around me. I also actually started to listen to Ben. He was telling me about how non native trees had been planted here and that they weren't all that good for the habitat. Apparently, the local critters can't make use of these exotic trees as well as they can the native ones. They chopped down the exotics in a small patch and had burned them. It was not a pretty sight. Everything around it was scorched, black and desolate. The pictures taken of this area show this. What you cannot really see in the pictures are these little teeny patches of green. If you get up real close with the camera, there it is! A tiny little sapling! In all this bleak black desolation, here were these little trees, and promise of new growth. This little voice, that voice that had been drowned out in deadlines and rush rush rush started to speak to me. I thought of this and how it related to my life. Here was Ben, the one who claims to not see how this all can be spiritual, teaching me something very spiritual and all I have to do is pay attention in order to notice it. But what was it? We traveled further up the mountain and he showed me areas that had been planted years before. These trees were not too horrible big yet, and where bunched really close together. He told me how they needed to be thinned out. We got further along and he showed me where they had planned to make a new trail. He explained how this would create a fire break and help safeguard against fire damage. There were trees running down this new trail that had red ribbons tied around them, marking them as the ones that were to be cut. True to my sometimes irreverent and farcical personality, I started into this whole little child-like skit all but myself in which the "angel of death" swooped down with the diabolical "red ribbon of death". "No, no, not me!," said I, pretending to be one of the trees, "not the red ribbon of death! Go away, I am too young to die!" To these trees, the crew members do have the power of life and death. Maybe I made it into a joke because the idea of death is hard for us to swallow, even if it is not us we are talking about, but rather trees. Ben explained that some people had a problem with them cutting down any trees at all, did not like to see the scorched out ground after they had done this. He explained very matter of factly that they had to do cut down individual trees in order to make the entire forest more healthy, that it would be best to leave it to nature, but since people had already been mucking about with the land, that they felt a need to come in and try to restore things back to where they were. I think that is when things sorta snapped into focus to me and I realised the lessons to be learned here and the strengths of Ben's spirituality. You see, Ben was looking at the land in a holistic manner. He was not only looking at the forest as a whole, but also looking at it in the future and the past. Looking at the forest this way meant to him that the scorched out areas where not dead and desolate, but were teeming with the promise of new life. Not only was Ben able to look at things with this mindset, but he was able to do the hard job of cutting down the trees and burning them, able to be the agent of destruction. I think in our own lives how we can be afraid to do this. How in often we can be afraid to clear out the things that may be harmful, out of place or alien to beings, but we are afraid to commit that act of destruction, to chop it down and burn it away leaving room for the new healthier things to grow.

When we came back down from the mountain, I was much calmer than I was when I went up, and I felt like I had taken back something with me. I took back a reminder to look at all of life in a more holistic manner and not be afraid to remove things if needed. I also took back an appreciation for the commitment and quiet spirituality that Ben had for the land that he looks after. He may not label it as "spirituality", but I could see clearly the deep connection that he had with the land and how he had learned from it to look at life in a different more holistic way. And I am glad that they are doing their work so that in the future, the forest will be there for others to learn from as well.