Fig trees, passings and new growth

We've arrived.

Our journey across the United States was relatively easy though tedious. We had good weather most of the way except through Indiana. The big monster summer storms in Kansas were in our rearview mirror. We covered 3,077 miles and nine states.

Alas, my mother died while we were on the road. I am so blessed that she phoned me on my birthday. She died in her sleep two days later. She was 90, very frail, and she very much wanted to join my dad. Regretfully I did not get to California before she went.

The Daily Office gospel reading this morning Mark 11:12-26 is about a fig tree no longer bearing fruit, and it sounds a bit harsh (curses and all). The gospel writer doubtless meant this passage as a metaphor for institutional and spiritual atrophy, but it is also a reminder of the cycle of life. Life has a way of thriving, surviving and yet life eventually becomes fragile and frail. Trees no longer bear fruit and die.

And yet life does find a way. Resurrection comes. Life begins anew. Wounds are healed, hurts forgiven. Life and love wins.

“So I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have received it, and it will be yours.”