On Pilgrimage and Homecoming
Home is in the places that we revisit. It is not only the physical places like Cape Cod that we come back to, but also the places that perhaps we have only physically visited once or twice and yet return to again and again in our memories, our stories and even our dreams.
The Celts speak of these “Thin Places” where it would seem that the veil between this world and that of the Divine is so thin that you can just reach out and touch the ineffable. I love that the metaphor is of a Veil – simultaneously tactile and yet transparent, both concealing and revealing. In experiencing this thinness in my life, I have come to understand that the Divine Creator is present in all things – and we need to remember to stop, to look, and to acknowledge.
As an artist, I seek to capture these imaginings and experiences with cloth. I begin by dyeing and printing white fabric with colours created from the earth – plants bearing browns and reds and yellows and dark purple along with the surprising blue of indigo; and insects yielding pinks and reds, purples and browns. Layering brings unexpected combinations, juxtapositions and much to ponder.
Sometimes these cloths seem too precious to cut. But eventually, they are carefully cut and re-ordered into a new cloth with crisp seams or frayed edges. And all along the stories of these places, these moments, these experiences, are tangled within the web of the cloth. New threads are stitched in, and the chorus of stories include ancient tales from the mists of time; the witness of pilgrims before and since, and my own humble part.
The meditative rhythm of the needle passing back and forth through the cloth is reminiscent of the steps of pilgrimage. Each change of thread a renewed commitment to the journey. Often the stiches are meant just as a trace. Individually they seem so insignificant, unassuming. Together they create pattern, texture, richness, and even beauty. But these threads, some as tiny as a spider web, build together to add strength as well.
As in all lives there is rending too. Tears and strains, frayed edges and burst seams. There is patching and repair, new cloth added, and edges turned under. Sometimes the mend shows the outline of the tear, and other times it completely obscures it.
The threads of our personal stories, and those of our heritage, of our families (birth, adoptive and chosen) combine to build who we are. So like noticing and recognizing God in thin places, we need to recognize the threads that make us, that we carry with us, that we are or could be for others.
If you believe, as I do, that we are created in the image of a creative and creating God, then we must be inherently creative. Now not all of us are going to be a Leonardo daVinci, but that doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t seek some way to connect with the creative energy that makes the Universe sing.
Thomas Roach
Sunday, June 20, 2024
St James the Fisherman, Wellfleet, MA