Natural Icons
"Father Seraphim Rose, a twentieth-century Eastern Orthodox Christian, turned to the natural world for his icons. He taught that any part of God's creation could become a window to heaven, pointing the way to our mysterious Creator. Father Seraphim particularly loved trees and was known to bow down before them, sometimes throwing his arms around a particular tree. He was not worshiping the tree; rather, he was honoring it as a reflection of the wonder of God. He could also turn his attention to a single leaf, gazing at it for hours, allowing it to teach him.
"As I was writing this chapter in my cabin in the mountains, I looked up from my work to discover a small rabbit sitting on the mat outside the sliding glass door. It was no more than six feet from me and absolutely still except for a slight twitching of the nose. This rabbit seemed like my own personal icon sent by God for me to gaze at and learn from. So I too stayed still, learning in my body and soul the pulsing stillness of a wild creature. I do not know how much time passed before the rabbit with simple grace hopped quietly away. I continued to sit, knowing this icon had been a window to heaven.
"Windows to the holy are all around us if we will stop and gaze. You need not go to the mountains or the seashore to find a piece of creation with which to pray. A houseplant will do, a single flower, or a fallen leaf. If a park is available, you might stroll slowly, gazing at the colors, shapes, and movement around you. You might prefer to find a bench and sit to gaze at the wonder of the world passing by.
"We can also find icons in our ordinary surroundings. The city in which I live has numerous statues on corners or in courtyards available for anyone to see. Outside our library is a sculpture of a young girl sitting with a book in her lap and a dog at her feet. Gazing at that piece of art, I feel the wonder of children, the miracle of books, and my hope for the future. Some of the statues are more abstract; yet each time I gaze at them, I see an aspect that touches my heart in a new way.
"One day I was feeling trapped in a city with no way to get out and enjoy the natural world. A wise man gently told me to open my eyes and see the wonder of where I was. 'We often long for meadows and forests,' he said, 'and forget to see what is before us. Everything made by human hands comes from the stuff of God's creation. Our Creator is not waiting only in the wilderness. God is waiting for us right here.'
Created in God's Image
" 'Right here' includes not only the environment of the present moment but also the people who inhabit our lives. Family, friends, neighbors, and strangers all offer us an opportunity to gaze at God. Scripture tells us that 'God created humankind in his image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them' (Gen. 1:27). Therefore, when we gaze at others with soft eyes and an open heart, we can discover the divine in all whom we meet.
"Thomas Merton, monk and mystic, was overcome by the way this view connected him to all humanity. He wrote in his journal: 'Yesterday, in Louisville, at the corner of 4th and Walnut, [I] suddenly realized that I loved all the people and that none of them were, or, could be totally alien to me.' Later as Merton gazed at photographs of hundreds of individuals of all ages from many cultures and all walks of life, he exclaimed in his journal: 'All those fabulous pictures. . . How scandalized some . . . would be if I said that the whole book is to me a picture of Christ and yet that is the Truth.' What insight! You may have had such thoughts yourself, although sometimes it is hard to see the holy in every person.
"Gazing at the ones I love, I can easily see the holy shining through their very being. I know they are created in the image of the Creator, each one a child of God. But with some people I cannot transfer this way of seeing so easily, not to those I do not like or strangers I fear. Once I witnessed an altercation between a customer and a clerk in a grocery store. I did not see those two angry people as reflections of God. I simply wanted to run from the escalating voices; the angry, defensive facial expressions; and the possibility of violence. I lowered my eyes and shrank into myself, wishing the scene would go away. What might have happened if I had gazed at these wounded, vulnerable people and seen God in them, turning my gazing into prayer? What could I have learned? How would my heart have been touched? How might it have changed the atmosphere of the moment?
"Many opportunities are present to gaze at people and discover God. The challenge is to practice this form of prayer with unlikely people. Who are the difficult individuals in your life? Are you willing to begin to see them as children of God?
"A woman who participated in a mentoring program at a local state prison told me how she had come to see all the inmates — but particularly the woman to whom she had been assigned — as Christ. 'I was so anxious and frightened when I went the first time,' she said. 'I wondered what in the world I had gotten myself in for as I was ushered through locked gates and doors. At our first meeting the prisoner seemed sullen and unwilling to share, but as I returned faithfully week after week she began to tell me her story — her history, her fears, her hopes and dreams. As our months together drew to a close I realized how she had ministered to me. She had broken my heart open through her trust, her words, and her shy smile. She had become Christ in my life. I pray I served her as well.'
The Eyes of Christ
"Just as Jesus teaches us to see and care for him in the stranger, the hungry and thirsty, the naked, sick, and imprisoned (Matt. 25:42-46), he models for us how to gaze at others with compassion. As I read the stories of Jesus' ministry, I like to imagine his gaze on those he taught and healed. I wonder how it would have felt to be among the crowd when he told us not to worry about our lives — asking us if we by worrying could add a single hour to our span of life (Luke 12:22-25). As I hear his words, I imagine him looking directly and lovingly at me. I place myself in the shoes of the bent-over woman whom Jesus healed in the synagogue. In this story he not only saw her, he touched her and declared her free from her ailment (Luke 13:10-13). Consider what would happen if we experienced being seen this deeply and truly? What might our world be like if we could gaze at one another — loved ones and strangers, friends and foes — through the eyes of Christ? Create an image in your mind of such a world and gaze at it with an open heart, willing to learn the wisdom it has to share.
"Gazing at icons and the created world, seeing others and being seen through the eyes of Christ are all forms of prayer. Praying by gaze can be practiced in community as in the Eastern Orthodox tradition where icons fill churches and are part of the liturgy. We can also pray alone in front of a painting or by gazing at the created world in the midst of our busy lives. Gazing helps us attend to the holy that surrounds us in art, nature, and other people. Like other methods of prayer, gazing brings us into a deeper and more intimate relationship with God and opens the possibility of union with our Maker, the ultimate goal of the Christian spiritual life. Fourteenth-century mystic Meister Eckhart described this union in terms of vision: 'The eye with which I see God is the same eye as that with which God sees me. My eye and the eye of God are one eye, one vision, one knowledge, and one love.' "
