WEEK OF PENTECOST 15, 2010

Magpie, Delivering Good News and Inviting Good People

Patty and I were in Colorado over Labor Day weekend for a wedding. As we walked up to the Wedding Garden in Crested Butte on the morning of the rehearsal, I stopped to take a picture of the mountain.

Suddenly a black-billed magpie swooped into my viewer screen, landing on the right hand side of the sign in the photo above. I had never before heard of much less seen a black-billed magpie.

This frequent flyer in the Northwest is revered in Asia as a herald of good news, and there was good news and joy in abundance on this weekend. A perfect sign of the occasion.

The bride was beautiful in her gown, surrounded by family and friends. The groom who in the winter had flown a backward somersault on skis off a mountain cliff, stood rock solid at her side. We celebrated and blessed this wedding in Holy Matrimony in the picturesque grandeur of a mountain valley, worshippers in an open-air sanctuary at high altitude, elated by nature and juiced with the Holy Spirit.

Francis of Assisi, patron saint of eco-spirituality, would have been happy and proud. Church at 9,275 feet above sea level, twentysomething style!

"Let all the ends of the earth revere God" . . . Let earth and wind, fire and rain, glorify the Lord our God . . . all God's creatures . . . all God's children . . . sing God's praise!