All Living Things Are Holy

Noble Tree Foundation Invocation, November 11, 2005

By Dr. Benjamin Bernard Dunlap, President, Wofford College

     I have been asked to give an invocation. Let me say first that, given its Latin derivation, to invoke is “to call into our midst” – though, of course, there is no need to summon what is always there. It is rather for us to sharpen our awareness.

Consider, then, what it must be like to stand rooted in place throughout a lifetime. Consider a tree, no matter how noble, standing immobile, unable to move but aware – somehow aware – of creatures gifted with mobility that race and scamper through your branches or loll and stroll beneath your canopy; that have the power of action, wielding axes, tractors, backhoes; that even, through the action of planting seeds, appear to have the power of creation. What must it be like, branching outwards symmetrically, growing always towards the light, unable to flee but knowing – somehow, in the very bracts and chloroplasts of your being–that there is always the threat or the potential of something else, a death and transfiguration. . . into firewood, furniture, chopsticks, books?

Thank heaven for our feet and fur, warm-blooded creatures that we are!

But consider, too, what a sentient tree might comprehend about our species, rooted as we are in time if not in space, moving about oblivious to the fact that we too branch out symmetrically, true to what we are, repeating ourselves relentlessly through life, genetically encoded and creatures of such habit that, as was said by one of our own tribe, “a man’s character is his fate.”

We are, in some essential way, less mobile than we suppose – which is to say, we are closer to the green world than we think, and what we should invoke tonight is awareness of that fact.

We were born as a species in a garden – not just Eden, but this blue-green paradise of a planet. Our instructions were to tend that garden, but, distracted from the task by other aspirations, we disobeyed and lost the garden. And, ever since, our myths and stories have ruminated on how we might recover what was lost – by discovering Shangri-la or through the little door to Alice’s wonderland and over the endless sea to find new worlds unspoiled. It is only the rare individual who understands that our essential challenge is to restore the garden we ruined. Our banishment, such as it is, was into a waste that we ourselves had made. It is our job to unmake it, not merely for ourselves but for posterity.

That greatest of landscape architects, Frederick Law Olmstead, in reporting on one of his completed projects, quoted John Ruskin: “Let it not be for present delight, nor for present use alone,” he said of his accomplishment. “Let it be such work as our descendants will thank us for, and let us think. . . that a time is to come when . . . men will say, ‘See! This our fathers did for us!’”

So, let us tonight invoke not only the task before us but gratitude for what has been done for us. Let us acknowledge that, as there are giants of the forest, there are giants among men – growing ever towards the light, creating abundance and beauty. For them and for that truly noble work, we should pray – as I ask you to join me now in doing:

O Lord, look with favor, we pray, on this occasion. Bless the gardener and the garden. Nurture us as we attempt to nurture your creation. And make us ever mindful that, as they are but reflections of You, all living things are holy. Amen.