How to Find Spiritual Truth in a Red Pepper
How do vegetables nourish
spirit as well as body?
The next time you are getting ready to prepare a salad for your supper, pause for a moment and listen for the wisdom that a tomato or pepper holds for you.
Begin by taking out your Smartphone and take a few pictures of a pepper from several angles before adding it to your salad…the pepper, not the phone! This is the first step in a practice of using photos of everyday things as inspiration for spiritual growth.
You don’t have to be a professional photographer! You only need to keep your phone close by, capture any images that interest you and pause a few moments asking with an open heart “What do you want to tell me?” (Because you now have a photo, go ahead and eat the pepper.)
What is ‘Spirituality’?
Spirituality is not theology. It is not about religion or philosophy. It goes a lot deeper than the mind and lives in our tissues in the same way that love and hope and fear take up residence in our bodies.
Let me give you an example of finding spirituality from my own life. . .
Growing up in a Christian tradition everything I thought I knew about spirituality came from Bible verses and old hymns. However, most of this learning was external to my life, practiced on Sunday and left behind on Monday; discussed in Youth Fellowship but not with friends or later with coworkers.
Like many people, I wanted to defend the faith of my childhood and listened with a closed heart to anyone with a different ‘spirituality’ which I understood in my young mind as religious practices or traditions. Little did I know then!
Yet, I was curious, and as I grew, I began to study different religions and eventually went to seminary. I didn’t feel the connection between the theology in my head and the pulse beating steadily within my heart that would open me to Mystery beyond my understanding until after I graduated from seminary and continued my hike into the Unseen ahead of me. It was on this journey that I began to understand the real meaning of spirituality.
Where Can We Learn About Our Spirituality?
An infinite number of ordinary, everyday things connect us with the unseen Mystery inside which some people call Spirit and others may refer to as Universe, or God. I first felt it when I planted a vegetable garden.
As I collected food, I also harvested something much deeper than I could find in a theology book. Taking the day’s bounty into the kitchen to prepare supper I beheld not only vibrant red color, delicate shape and tender stem, I contemplated what it hid inside — revealed when I cut it in half.
I have had several ‘deep cuts’ in my life – times when there has been painful separation because of death, illness, loss of relationships or dreams. At these times, instead of peering inside, I looked outside of myself to
- Find the cause – something or someone to blame. Not productive.,
- Find a solution – a way to fix it. Not helpful.
- Find someone to console me. Helpful if they direct me back to my inner wisdom.
Some people I turned to for consolation were poets like Rumi and Rilke, and Mary Oliver. Especially Mary Oliver. She wrote about the richness found in the ordinary — trees, fences and wild animals. She understood sacredness in the mundane. She taught me that what I had spent decades searching for in church, seminary and religious practices is a lot closer to home than that. We only need a window to see it.
Reflection on something as simple as a sweet red pepper or a slice of tomato,
is one window that helps us experience inner wisdom or a spiritual awakening.
Emptiness as Sacred Space
After I had sliced the red pepper to prepare for my supper, I paused. A pause long enough to see, not only the color, shape and seeds, but especially all the emptiness surrounding them.
I thought about how I feel when I am ‘empty’ – a sensation I often rush to fill as soon as possible with the closest food on hand. Usually junk food.
What would happen to seeds inside of us – little germs of creativity and wisdom that are waiting to ripen and mature and bear new fruit – if we fill all our uncomfortable empty spaces with popcorn and soda?
Reflecting on this question as I held the pepper in my hand I slowly began to change my relationship to food. This single red pepper helped me see emptiness as sacred space and I became reluctant to make it a sugar and starch storage bin.
An Icon of What Lies Ahead
I finished my salad that day with slices of tomato. If you are familiar with Celtic Christianity, you will notice the symbol of the Celtic Cross. For a Christian it is also a symbol of love and hope.
I hope this short reflection on cut vegetables has given you some ideas about accessing your own inner Spirit from the depths of your refrigerator.
