When Nature Is Your Church

The photo called my name from across the room. Someone's left an old Sunset Magazine in a coffee shop, and I'm drawn forward.

This can’t be real, I think. How have I never known something so beautiful exists in my state? It says here Theodore Roosevelt declared it the eighth wonder of the world, so we’re talking like 120-some years ago.

I dutifully add McArthur-Burney Falls Memorial State Park to my ever-growing list of places I'm determined to see.

And there it sat, on the list, for a good seven to eight years.

Some places aren’t near major airports. Some are a little out of the way, and that’s why they’re less visited, less trampled, and less popular. It was hard to find the time, to make the necessary plans, map it out and make it all worth it.

Life interfered. Covid happened.

I experienced an out-of-nowhere first-time bout with severe Anxiety and Depression.

Confession — before that, I’d thought they weren’t really “things” and that people just needed to work a little harder to pull it together.

Suicidal ideation appeared out of nowhere and drove me to end it.

All of that is its own essay for another writing, but after mercifully agreeing to the right medication, when the clouds had finally fully parted, within two weeks I organized a journey north to see McArthur-Burney.

My partner Eddie captured the above feature image of me sitting before its majesty, the mist floating to my face, a tear running down my cheek, when I truly, truly, felt a religious experience, closer to God, to Universe, to The Force, to all of it.

And again, I knew in my soul that nature, yes, nature is my church.

This is not some anti-religion tirade.

Nor is this me saying I've actively rejected organized religion in favor of nature.

This is about how when I’m within nature, completely in the moment, at peace, taking in the beauty surrounding me — all the creation and power and majesty of it — those are the moments that bring the mystical feeling of gratitude and love and peace that no church has ever successfully given.

It can be the greenest valley below a towering mountain, a splendid seashore, an unexpected burbling stream in a clean desert landscape or a view from above that takes the breath away. But they all evoke that feeling of being one with the planet, with the universe, with creation — and the gratitude to have the eyes to appreciate it, the legs and the independence to experience it.

When Did It Start?

I was never a big outdoor backpacker type in my youth. Camping wasn’t exactly my bag, but I could appreciate the fresh air.

It was when I moved west of the Rockies in the United States that I became more aware of the awe-inspiring beauty that surrounds us. My soul was suddenly telling me, these places must be visited and properly honored.

In the early 2000s, my partner Eddie told me a story from when he and his sister visited England and made it to Stonehenge. His sister — at the time a woman not prone to over-emotion — stood there and suddenly had what she called a religious experience or God moment, where the tears just flowed and flowed and she didn’t know why.

It was all just so much for the soul and mind to try and take in and comprehend. There was something “there.”

Many of you probably know what I’m talking about and have your own religious experience, God moments in nature.

They can sneak up on you, and not always in the expected destinations.

While Yosemite National Park left me speechless in my admiration, for some reason it was when I stepped onto Pfeiffer Beach along California's Big Sur coastal region where time stopped and I lost a good half hour of my life — correction, I full-lived a good half hour of my life — just watching the waves, being teary-eyed and feeling the power of the Universe.

I was hypnotized and buzzing.

Similarly, I’ve been lucky enough to spend time at The Grand Canyon in Arizona and Zion National Park in Utah — both of them, captivating.

But for some reason, unexpectedly and out of nowhere, I got all verklempt and sobbing at one of the Bryce Canyon National Park overlooks. I’d seen “bigger” and “better” scenery, but the sight of the otherworldly hoodoos was hard to take in. I had to just sit with it, with pleasure.

Zion, The Grand Canyon — so much bigger and more impressive — but for some reason this moment broke through my shell and brought emotion.

Now, I can hear some of you thinking —

“Well sure, we all have good moments when we’re on vacation.”

No, I’m talking about something more than that.

I can have these God moments when I escape the cacophony of sound that is our modern industrial existence and hear birds singing in the trees at a park — where the silence is so blissfully silent that it hurts your ears.

I’m not thinking, analyzing and evaluating.

I’m not anxious.

I might be questioning something, but isn’t that part of all faiths and religious existence?

I am fully present, fully alive and feeling the kind of joy and love, self-assurance and strength that many a traditional religious ceremony has never brought to my soul, sadly.

Why go to a physical-building church if you rarely step out afterwards feeling better about yourself, inspired and full of wonder?

Without a doubt it varies from religion to religion, parish to parish and church leader to church leader, but Nature is my church and where I find solace, tears and moments of quiet astonishment.

In Cheryl Strayed’s book Wild (later made into a movie starring Reese Witherspoon), she recounts her journey across the Pacific Coast Trail and her challenging relationship with her mother, a woman who offers a life gem that’s always stuck with me —

“There’s always a sunrise and a sunset and it’s up to you to choose to be there for it. Put yourself in the way of beauty.”

Come join me, if this is the church that speaks to you.

Seek out those sunrises when the day is new and everything seems possible. Visit that waterfall that’s been on your list. Take time to stop and see those wildflowers.

Your religious experiences may be waiting outside the walls of a church, and they are just as valid — for they keep you living and in love with life.