By the grace of God somehow, for the past 30 years we have lived in the midst of lush green woodland(1). The beauty which surrounds us, despite the inevitable effects of slow but sure urban sprawl, uplifts the spirit. We also regularly make incursions into Lowell so as not to lose touch with the other parts of our roots, especially the people.

“Littleton Massachusetts was the site of the sixth Praying Indian village established by John Eliot in 1645 consisting of mainly Native Americans of the Massachusett tribes. It was called Nashoba Plantation, on the land between Lake Nagog and Fort Pond. The term “Praying Indian” referred to Native Americans who had been converted to Christianity. Daniel Gookin, in his Historical Collections of the Indians in New England, (1674) chapter vii. says:

Nashobah is the sixth praying Indian town. This village is situated, in a manner, in the centre, between Chelmsford, Lancaster, Groton and Concord. It lieth from Boston about twenty-five miles west north west. The inhabitants are about ten families, and consequently about fifty souls.^[2]… Wikipedia ⁶

The town was settled by Anglo-European settlers in 1686 and was officially incorporated by act of the Massachusetts General Court on November 2, 1715. It was part of the Puritan and later Congregational culture and religion of New England.

Not far from Concord, I have long walked the shores of Walden Pond where Henry David Thoreau lived on and off in a small cabin from which he wrote his famous book, Walden, a masterpiece of observation of the natural world (Creation), a text which rests beside me now and which I have read so many times. If you don’t have a copy I hope you will consider getting it. It will not disappoint. It is a powerful point for contemplating Creation.

Uni-verse

For some time now I have worried about catching up to repair a neglect in balance here, and that Catholic Critique needs to remedy the deficiency of neglecting Creation. Someone has said that God has given us two “books,” sacred Scripture and Creation; and that we are to live in and contemplate each, neglecting neither the one nor the other. Ours is a beautiful world in itself situated in the vast immensity of the uni-verse (not the imaginative “multiverse” of some physicists and others). Creation is a teacher given to us by our Creator, the Holy Trinity. It is also an inexhaustible mystery. We need to study it without falling into the pitfalls of ideologies.

Reality is one.

“We must say that the distinction and multitude of things come from the intention of the first agent, who is God. “For He brought things into being in order that His goodness might be communicated to creatures, and be represented by them.

And because His goodness could not be adequately represented by any one creature alone, He produced many and diverse creatures, that what was wanting to one in the representation of the divine goodness might be supplied by another.

“For goodness, which in God is simple and uniform, in creatures is manifold and divided and hence the whole universe together participates in the divine goodness more perfectly, and represents it better than any single creature whatever.” (Summa theologiae, I.47.1, emphasis added)

Expect more about Creation now, God willing, not to the neglect of other important matters, but in more balance, proportion and spiritual magnitude.

Stephen Hand 7/25/26

(1) Top Photo: Somewhere in Ireland which reminded me of so many somewheres near where we live in Littleton.