I Know a Green (Fall) Cathedral

My first-ever school solo was a song called, "I Know a Green Cathedral." While I sometimes can't remember why I walked into a room, I still remember the words to that song. It says, in part:

I know a green cathedral

A shadowed forest shrine

Where leaves in love join hands above

And arch your prayers and mine.

Within its cool depths sacred, 

A priestly cedar sighs,

And the fir and pine lift arms divine 

Unto the pure blue skies.

Though the "green cathedral" was starting to be touched by fall colors, I couldn't help but think of the song as we visited the Thorncrown Chapel in Eureka Springs, Ark.

Someday, Randy wants to go to the eastern part of the U.S. in the fall to join other ubiquitous "leaf peepers." I'm not opposed to the idea, but it seemed we'd just gotten home from a long trip to Glacier, Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. Plus, how do you guess the optimum time for leaf "peeping?"

I threw out the idea to go to the Ozarks, a much closer destination that's also known for viewing fall foliage. We could get there in a day, which appealed to both of us. And Brent and Susan had enjoyed a trip to Eureka Springs a couple years ago, so that was where my vacation planner (AKA Randy) decided for us to headquarter. 

The fall foliage was muted, thanks to the same drought that has plagued our area. But we still enjoyed our time in the Ozarks. Thorncrown Chapel was one "must-do" stop for me in Eureka Springs. I've seen beautiful engagement and wedding photos taken there, so I wanted to see the unique chapel for myself. It lived up to the hype.

Thorncrown Chapel was the dream of Jim Reed, a native of Pine Bluff, Ark. In 1971, Jim purchased the land which is now the site of the chapel to building his retirement home. However, other people admired the location and would often stop at his property to gain a better view of the Ozark hills. Instead of fencing them out,Jim chose to invite in by building a glass chapel in the woods. 

Shortly thereafter, Jim met architect E. Fay Jones, who accepted his proposal to design the chapel. On March 23, 1979, the construction crew broke ground to a halt. However, soon the building process came to a halt when Jim feared he didn't have the funds to complete the project. 

"I am not proud of the fact, but the first time I ever got down on my knees was on the chapel floor. I prayed more seriously than ever before. all the trials and tribulations gave me the humility to get on my knees." 

- Jim Reed

This was taken mid-afternoon, while the others were taken in the morning. It shows how the chapel changes in different light. But it's beautiful anytime. I've also seen pretty photos taken after a snowfall. However, it's closed in January and February, except for weddings and other private events.

A few days later, a woman from Illinois provided a loan, allowing Jim to finish his dream. In July 1980, Thorncrown Chapel opened. Since then, people from all over the world have visited the little chapel in the woods. 

Thorncrown Chapel is like the utterance of a proverb. It reveals, in a whisper, that silence can speak to us, stillness can enliven us, and being present to the eternal lessons of the Earth and its Creator can give cause and direction to better our lives.

- Randall Connaughton, author of Thorncrown Chapel: Divine Light

The chapel is 48 feet tall. Its wooden structure contains 425 windows and more than 6,000 square feet of glass. It sits atop more than 100 tones of native stone and colored flagstone. Since it opened in 1980, more than 7 million people have visited the sanctuary.

A cross adorns every light in the chapel. The darker it gets, the more visible they become.  

A nondenominational congregation meets for Sunday services at 9 and again at 11 AM, April through October. There's only an 11 AM service November through mid-December. The congregation is led by Pastor Doug Reed, the son of the chapel's founder.

 

Visiting the chapel doesn't require an appointment, though visits may get curtailed by weddings, especially on the weekends. There is no cost to visit, though donations are accepted, and they offer a few items for sale.

There is also a worship center on the grounds. However, it was closed for renovations. Both the worship center and the roof of the chapel itself was damaged in a hail storm. However, none of the chapel's windows were broken.

 

From the outside, it looks like some of the design is reminiscent of the chapel itself. I recommend a visit!

That wasn't our only faith-based stop of the trip. We also went to The Great Passion Play. For several years, the Stafford community did its own passion play in a pasture during the season of Lent under the leadership of the late Pastor Guy Elliott. It was pretty remarkable for a community our size. But the Great Passion Play in Eureka Springs was equally impressive for the huge cast and the elaborate set.

I didn't get excellent photos of the play, but we both enjoyed it and thought it was a wonderful retelling of the Passion of Jesus Christ.

Besides all the actors, it included camels, goats and other Biblical-period animals.

The play is performed three nights a week from the last week of May through the end of October in a 4,100-seat amphitheater.

We didn't get to the grounds in time to tour Christ of the Ozarks on the night of the play. But we went back at dusk another evening.

Christ of the Ozarks was erected in 1966 and stands 67 feet fall with a 65-foot arm span. The foundation of the statue required 340 tons of concrete interlaced with steel welded into the rock of Magnetic Mountain.

The statue is made of 24 layers of white mortar on a steel frame. It was necessary to build an elevator up the side of the framework which was completely surrounded by scaffolding during construction. The face is approximately 15 feet in height and the statue weights more than 2 million pounds.

We had one other church-related stop during an historic trolley tour of Eureka Springs. It was Saint Elizabeth of Hungary Catholic Church.

The church claims to be the only one in America that you enter through a Bell Tower, a fact noted in Ripley's Believe It or Not. The chapel was completed in 1904.

The stained glass windows are beautiful.

These photos represent only a few of them.

Of course, I liked this one with wheat featured.

More from our Eureka Springs trip will be in upcoming blogs.

Fall Bounty

I took my first "vacation" shot a mile after we left home last week. Admittedly, I take a lot of photos. But unless it's a departure selfie of Randy and me, I usually get a little further down the road.

But, as we departed for a trip to Eureka Springs last week, I noticed the eastern sky and I just couldn't resist. I sent our kids a text to that effect. Our son-in-law texted back: "Pretty, but hopefully you can make it a few more miles before the next picture or it will be a long trip!"

For the record, I did make it to Independence, Kansas, before getting my camera out again. (I will have more photos from our trip to Eureka Springs, Arkansas, in upcoming blog posts. I don't like to post photos to Facebook while we are gone, and it takes awhile to edit photos and write about our adventures.)

I had another reason for my premature snapshots. Randy had told me the milo would likely be cut while we were gone. And another confession: I don't take nearly as many photos of the farm as I did when we were actively farming. 

The milo field at the corner south of our house had been pretty for weeks, but I hadn't ever taken the time. It was now or never, so I had Randy pull over the at half-mile line for a few photos.

And, indeed, the milo was cut while we were gone.  

The average yield for milo raised on our farmground was 110 bushels per acre. Kudos to Tye and Todd: That's the best milo we've ever had.

Also while we were gone, our calves from the Class of 2024 were weaned and averaged 638 pounds apiece. Tye and Todd arranged to sell the feeder calves (ours and theirs) directly to a feedlot.

Pretty sweet, huh? We didn't have to deal with any breakdowns or other harvest issues with milo. We didn't have to round up the cattle from summer pasture and do the sorting of mamas and babies. This retirement gig is all right.

 

Faith and the Night Sky

October 15 - my first attempt at taking a photo of the visiting comet

Not long ago, I saw a devotional that suggested we read a passage of the Bible and then try to figure out who in the story most resonates with us.

Am I most like the Samaritan woman? Or am I one of the ones in the crowd, judging her? That will stop you in your tracks, right?

And poor Thomas. Say the name Thomas and ask how that disciple fits into Jesus' resurrection story, and the first thing we do is add a derogatory adjective to it. It's not simply Thomas. But Doubting Thomas.

I must admit that as Randy and I searched the western skies for the Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS, I might have that same "Doubting" adjective attached to my name. 

From a Facebook post

Try as we might, we couldn't find it - not with our naked eyes. Not with Randy's binoculars. Not even with my iPhone, which everyone said was the easier way to find it. However, when we went back inside and I did the inevitable scrolling through Facebook, it appeared that others had figured out the "secret formula." They got photos of the comet. 

If we'd relied only on our naked eye, the same could have been said for the Northern Lights.

October 10, 2024

On October 10, news stations were saying that Kansans might again have the opportunity to see the Northern Lights because of solar storms. We had made a similar excursion in May. I thought maybe that had been a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, but I was glad for another chance. 

Just like in May, we struggled to see the Northern Lights with our naked eye. But when I looked through my iPhone, the camera's eye was able to see what I couldn't. (Interestingly, Randy's Android phone didn't provide that view.)

It reminded me of the poem, "Who Has Seen the Wind?" by Christina Rossetti.

Who has seen the wind?

Neither I nor you:

But when the leaves hang trembling,

The wind is passing through.

Who has seen the wind?

Neither you nor I:

But when the trees bow down their heads,

The wind is passing by. 

Just like the wind that's "invisible" unless it's stirring the leaves (or unprotected fallow farm ground), the lights weren't visible without some help. 

As we stood in the cool fall night, I thought again about how that was a metaphor for faith. 

Hebrews 11 Now faith is confidence in what we hope for and assurance about what we do not see. ² This is what the ancients were commended for.³ By faith we understand that the universe was formed at God’s command, so that what is seen was not made out of what was visible.

Following those initial verses, there is a whole chapter of familiar Bible names and the ways they carried out their faith.  

The New Century translation says it this way:

Faith means being sure of the things we hope for and knowing that something is real even if we do not see it.” 

 Hebrews 11:1 (NCV)

What is faith? Faith is believing when you can’t see it. People say, “Seeing is believing.” God says the exact opposite: “Believing is seeing.” Some things you’ll never see unless you believe them first. Every great achievement started when someone first believed it was possible. Faith turns dreams into realities. Nothing happens until someone first believes it’s possible.

We went out a couple of different times and a couple of different locations. The light patterns moved somewhat from the first time we looked to the second time. 

And there was a scientific explanation for why were were able to see the Northern Lights so far south. (Again, count on Facebook to help a girl out.)

 

Still ... as we stood in the dark with a kaleidoscope of color overhead, I couldn't help but think about just how fortunate we are to see the beauty in God's Creation - that we are able to witness "the universe  formed at God’s command." 

An update: 

We tried again to find the comet after seeing a graphic about where to look in the night sky on specific days and Googling information on changing my iPhone settings. 

It's still not an award-winning photo, but we did get to see it.

October 16, 2024

We got a little chilly. In January, we'll think that 50 degrees feels balmy, but our bodies haven't quite made the shift from summer temperatures to the autumn cooling. So once we found the comet and its tail and I "sorta-kinda" got a photo, we were ready to head back inside.

I was glad to witness it after a recent reminder from an email devotional:

A Time to Think

The simple act of stopping and looking at the beauty around us can be prayer.

-- Patricia Barrett, author

 

A Time to Act

 

Today notice the little things that make your day special.

 

A Time to Pray

Thank you Lord, that however small or seemingly insignificant our gifts, You can weave them into Your glorious symphony.   

Corn Harvest from the Jump Seat

 

Randy feels good about our decision to retire from active farming in August 2022. But there are times when he misses it, and he gets a little "itchy" - and that itch doesn't have a thing to do with the ever-present harvest dust. Harvest was always Randy's favorite time of the year. Well ... Until he had a breakdown. Or the combine got stuck. Or the employee didn't show up.

So maybe experiencing harvest in the combine's "buddy seat" is OK after all. Let's hope the combine operator was just as happy to have a rider as Randy always was when a kid, grandkid or curious guest showed up. 

 

He was able to ride for a little while as a custom harvester was cutting one of our corn fields. (The ride and the photos were taken September 27.)

 

Our corn averaged 80 bushels per acre. Todd and Tye Miller, who farm our ground, had some fields that had higher yields at other locations. However, Randy says it was a nice surprise after the field blew so badly after planting this spring because of drought and strong windstorms. 

 

The custom harvester - Frederick Harvesting out of Alden - was trying out an experimental combine, so Randy enjoyed looking at all the bells, whistles and cameras in the combine cab during his excursion. 

Tye and Todd still have some our milo to harvest this fall. We'll see if more combine rides are in Randy's future. 

A Golden Anniversary: Class of 1974

What happened in 1974?

And Randy and his classmates graduated from Stafford High School. Their celebration began last Friday night with a soup supper at the Stafford Senior Center. (How appropriate, right? There might have been a joke or two made about the location.)

 

 Friday night soup supper crowd

Back row: Jim Carter, Rex Hildebrand, Randy Fritzemeier, Tom Tuckwood, Dale Hearn, Gregg Blew, Terry McCune, Richard Brensing, Rex Hoskinson, Bob Howell

Front row: Gemma Austin, Nancy Hildebrand, Connie Harmon, Renee Salem, Marcia Bauerle, Jim Powell

Last weekend during Stafford's Oktoberfest, they celebrated their 50th class reunion. When you're 17 or 18 and walking across the stage to receive your diploma, you don't realize how quickly those 50 years will fly by.

Different people came to different parts of the reunion. This was Saturday night following the all-school alumni banquet. (The only one not identified before is Peggy Miller, second from the right in the front row.)

Randy's class has done a great job getting together every five years since graduation for reunions. I've been to all but the first one, so it kind of feels like I'm part of them, too. 

They've lost 12 of their 46 classmates, which I thought seemed like quite a few. Some have been able to be at all the reunions and others live much further away and were just able to get back for a few milestone gatherings like the 50th.

Photo by Julie McNickle

 

 They were also part of the annual Oktoberfest parade.

Photo by Dale Hearn - Getting ready for the parade

Some of the spouses got into the photo at the Nora Larabee Memorial Library Saturday afternoon.

Thanks to Julie McNickle for the photo from Saturday night's alumni banquet (below). She does a great job in documenting events through her photography.

Hopefully, my Skyline High School Class of 1975 get-together for our 50th next year will be just as successful.

Them Thar Hills

 

"There's gold in them thar hills."

According to folklore, in 1849, from the steps of the Lumpkin County Courthouse, a Dahlonega, Georgia mint assayer, Dr. M.F. Stephenson, yelled to the townspeople, "There's gold in them thar hills." He wanted to keep people looking for gold in Georgia, rather than leaving for California.

We found some "gold" in the Flint Hills of Kansas during a recent golfing excursion. But the gold was in the form of wildflowers - not minerals. 

At a senior golf tournament Randy played in this summer, some of his golfing companions talked about playing the Wabaunsee Pines Golf Course. We had a day between tennis and volleyball matches while in Topeka, so we - like the gold prospectors - went west.

Of course, we weren't going as far west as California, but just to Wabaunsee County. 

 

Wabaunsee Pines is a nine-hole public golf course featuring limestone berms and native grasses of the Flint Hills. It's been called “The Gem of the Flint Hills” and we now know why.

The course was constructed and maintained with volunteer labor and has irrigated greens, tees, and fairways.Wabaunsee Pines Golf Association, Inc. was incorporated in 1993. In 2014, a group of patrons joined together and created the “Double Eagle Club” which funds the course's only employee. Before that time, it was maintained by all volunteer labor.

The beauty of the Kansas Flint Hills is just natural - no grooming required. 

 This time of year, the fall wildflowers provided a beautiful backdrop to a nice course.

 

The course is adjacent to Lake Wabaunsee.

Kansas may have a reputation for being flat. But the Flint Hills are just one exception to that rule.

My golfer would recommend it. 

On the way back to Topeka, we had lunch at the Sommerset Cafe in the tiny town of Dover. 

Photo by Taylor Hunt from Facebook photos

 I didn't take any photos (believe it or not.) But we would recommend it, too. The cafe is housed in a 19th-century clapboard building and serves homestyle cafe fare and classic pies. Yes, we had the pie. Randy had banana creme and I had Dutch apple. Yum! We would definitely make a return visit, if the opportunity arises.