Wanna Join a Religion?

It’s OK, there’s no Kool-Aid, and you can keep your britches on.

One of only a handful of books about Fay Jones. This one is by Robert Adams Ivy Jr. (“Fay Jones” [McGraw Hill]).

I wasn’t expecting to experience a spiritual conversion at my sister’s wedding, but these aren’t the kinds of things you put on your calendar.

I remember being a bit panicked as it happened. My oldest daughter, Maddy, was 3 or 4 years old at the time and was the flower girl. She was doing the job with the kind of random gusto that threatens to sidetrack many wedding processions.

But we got through that part. And as we all settled into our seats for the ceremony joining Ashley and Chris, I took a look left, right and up. After that, I don’t remember much more about the ceremony.

The wedding took place in Thorncrown Chapel in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. It’s a glass building in the middle of a forest. I don’t much cotton to “statement structures” plunked down in natural beauty. These vanity buildings usually look like an ugly brooch stuck to a map. Or that the architect was compensating for something deep in his pants. (Of course it’s a penis.)

But Thorncrown was designed by Fay Jones, an Arkansas architect who trained with Frank Lloyd Wright. And Jones knew how to marry Prairie Style architecture with the rocky Arkansas landscape.

His building opened a new eye inside my brain. Thorncrown represented – obviously – organized religion. It was something built by people, flawed and inadequate. And it was separate from but surrounded by the true divine – nature.

My thought wasn’t original – I’m sure many people make that connection when they sit on the padded pews at Thorncrown.

But what was wild was how far I took it.

The sun had set, so Thorncrown was wrapped in darkness. The light from the chapel didn’t reach the forest, so it was like being swallowed by a whale. I couldn’t see the trees, but I could feel them towering over the chapel, looking to the sky with a small glass box at their feet.

I’ll spare everyone here a clumsy description of a spiritual awakening. If you’ve never had one, it’s like falling in love, contracting the flu and having a panic attack all at the same time. And you’re dizzy, like being on a Tilt-A-Whirl after eating three chili dogs.

So, yeah, I worship trees now and have since that night in Thorncrown. And if there’s an organized religion for tree servants, I don’t want to know about it. After growing up in the Christian church, I learned that spirituality and the church don’t have a lot of overlap.