We Are Created To Be Enchanted With Everything

​Richard Rohr says, “The ability to respect the outsider is probably the litmus test of true seeing. And it doesn’t stop with human beings and enemies and the “least of these.” It moves to frogs and water and weeds. Everything becomes enchanting once we have full sight.”

When I read that this morning, I thought that is why I love running and hiking in the woods. I think that’s where I come closest to having “full sight.” Out there, everything enchants me. The trees, the dirt, the weeds – even the snake with the entire chipmunk in its mouth – I see beauty in it all.

In the woods, I can truly feel God’s all-encompassing appreciation. I think if I’m being honest, that’s because there aren’t any people there.

I don’t look at a tree and wonder, how can God appreciate that tree the same way he does me. I don’t wonder it when I look at the frogs or the water or the weeds. But when I come out of the woods, and interact with humans, there are days I get to wondering how God could possibly be as enchanted with ‘them’ as he is with me.

In the woods, it’s easy for me to look at the frog and then look at me and feel a oneness. A oneness that comes with knowing that God lovingly created us both. We were made to live in harmony; it’s a feeling that needs no further explanation.

But out of the woods, it feels like there’s a constant need for explanation - a constant convincing of sorts - that we really are made to live in perfect harmony. The natural connection I feel with a tree can feel equally unnatural when it comes to another human.

I suppose that’s because with the tree, the one thing we have in common is more than enough. We were both created by a God who loves us.

Too often, with humans, we start with the long list of things we don’t have in common: race, sexuality, religion, country of origin, political party and on and on. We start with this long list of not-in-commons as we walk through each other’s lives and by the time we get to this one beautiful thing we do have in common - it’s often never enough.

The thread that binds things together like a chain in the woods can feel like nothing more than cheap string outside of them.

It makes me wish I was God. Because as God walks among our lives, he doesn’t start with the list of not-in-commons. In fact, I’m not sure God ever gets to that list. I think God starts and ends with ‘I created it all; I love it all.’ As God walks through our lives, every day for him is an enchanted walk in the woods. Every day is a sense of oneness that requires no further explanation- no convincing.

Everything becomes enchanting when we have full sight. And I do believe we were created to be enchanted by everything. The fact that we don’t yet have that full sight doesn’t mean we aren’t capable of it. It just means we need to start using the sight we have to look at some things a little differently.

For me, it means looking at my walk through the streets a little more like I look at my walk through the woods. It means starting with our common denominator.

And stopping with it.