Care of the Land

"Spiritual orderliness originates in harmonious 
care of the land as sacred." 
   _____ Nigel P:enick, Celtic Sacred Landscapes 


    For the Celtic peoples, the land was inspired, able to reflect
whatever was done upon it. The concept of land as inert, unable
to respond was foreign to them. There was also a sense that not
every inch of the land could be used for human purposes, that
some was to be set aside as sacred to the spirits of the land.
    The prosperity of the land, the abundance of flocks and herds,
the fertility of fields and orchards - all these were dependent upon
the sacred ordering that gave respect to the spirit of the land. This
intrinsic knowledge arose from the land itself and was mirrored in
the way people behaved and believed. In an age when few of us
actually work the land with our own hands, this knowledge is now
retreating and we begin to see the products of the soil as commodities
rather than as inhabitants of the natural order.
   The very land and its inhabitants speak to us of spirit and sacred
order if we will listen to them. It is in the patient tending and listening
that those who have worked the land for generations know when a
plant or animal needs particular things, and when some profound
wisdom is being conveyed. If we make the spaces for those moments
of transmission, create opportunities for communication between
ourselves and the land, we may begin to embody the sacred orderliness
that maintains our whole ecology.

Go and listen to the land sometime this week. Be sensitive to its 
needs, your appropriate response to those needs, and the spiritual
lesson that it has to teach you. 
[From: The Celtic Spirit by Caitlin Matthews]