An article from the Cathedral Times
by the Very Reverend Samuel G. Candler,
Dean of the Cathedral of St. Philip
The glorious trees of Atlanta have shone us the way this year. For some spectacular reason, the city received exactly the right and mysterious amount of rainy and wet weather, and then sunny and dry weather, so that our fall foliage has been magnificent.
I went for a long walk on Sunday afternoon, to marvel at the leafy canopy above and also-I must admit-just to kick through those great piles of leaves in the street. Along the way, I met over ten neighbors, most of them also parishioners. We were all outdoors, being dragged by dogs, walking through the leaves, enjoying the revelation of divine glory.
Botanists tell me that these Fall leaf colors are actually the true colors of the deeper pigments in the leaves. When we see the leaves green as we do most of the year, those leaves are hard at the work of photosynthesis. The pigment chlorophyll is helping turn carbon dioxide and water into energy for the tree and oxygen for the world. But when the seasons change, and the daylight diminishes, the chlorophyll pigment fades away, and the leaf's deeper colors emerge.
These deeper colors are marvelous, aren't they? Red and orange and flame and all manner of shades that I cannot describe. I imagine that these truer colors of our lovely trees are lot like our own human colors. Often, we human beings do not get a chance to show our true colors until we take a rest, until we slow down our hard and churning normal business, until we let our deeper personalities show.
When we do take time to slow down, to go for a walk, maybe even to stop around this time of year, we re-discover our true selves. And, when we stop at this time of year, we also have the opportunity to give thanks. Yes, give thanks. It is hard to give thanks when we are moving in a hundred directions, driving here and there, arranging, organizing, buying, selling. I know that our work is important; like the leaves, our work provides nourishment to somebody!
However, the leaves also show us how to give thanks. Stop during this Thanksgiving. Take a look around the table. Notice the true colors of someone around you. Notice your own true colors. They are beautiful! Then, give thanks for those colors. Give thanks for those around you. And give thanks for the glorious God of creation.
The Very Rev. Sam Candler
P.S. And remember to give thanks with your generous pledge to the Cathedral! We need your glorious colors, too! When you get your pledge card, first of all, please pledge; it is the commitment that is most important. Secondly, do pledge as generously as you can; pledge as splendidly as these autumn trees have!