Flower Ceremony: “Shimmering Threads” of Connection

2025-06-01
There’s a presumption about ministers you might have heard, something like each of us only
has one good sermon in us, one we repeat over and over again. It’s a sermon we ourselves
need to hear, over and over again. I think there is truth in this. At least today, and, lately, I have
been aware of it in myself.

And what would define my sermon? Maybe you already know, or imagine you do. It’s a
message that feels true to me—both to my observation and experience, and to my values. It’s a
message that brings me hope even when the world is cruel, a message that sustains my faith
when certainty seems nowhere present, a message that lifts me, that enables me to feel joy,
even in the midst of profound sorrow. The message,that I have tried over and over to impart,
perhaps with some success, perhaps not. The message is: every single one of us, all of us,
everywhere, is unique and important, and we are all bound together, with everything, through
sometimes invisible but always shimmering threads of connection.

The absolute beauty of all reality lies in the profound differentiation of all things and in their
inevitable relationship. The profound beauty of all reality lies in knowing ourselves as ourselves
and yet part of something larger than ourselves. It’s a message that is singularly relevant as we
celebrate today both Flower Ceremony and our commitment to covenant.

Many people here are familiar with the writing of Robin Wall Kimmerer, an indigenous wisdom
keeper and western-trained botanist and teacher. Whether in her book on mosses or in The
Serviceberry or in Braiding Sweetgrass, one of her primary arguments—her heart-felt beliefs—is
that all reality is

“an architecture of relationship, of connections, [. . . and of] shimmering threads
that hold it all together, [. . . so that] we love the world, [so that] the most ordinary scrap of
meadow can rock us back on our heels in awe.”

I encourage you to look into her work if you
don’t already know it and to return to it regularly, as I do, if you already do.

When Kimmerer sees the seemingly random field of purple aster and yellow goldenrod, she
sees also the bees attracted and nourished, drawn to a good place of plenty so that their honey-
making can sustain themselves and the plenty can be shared with bears and ants and human
beings as well. In this, Kimmerer finds a pattern of beauty. “That pairing of purple and gold is
lived reciprocity: its wisdom is that the beauty of one is illuminated by the radiance of the other.”
And in “The Three Sisters,” we learn the wisdom of corn, beans, and squash planted
deliberately together for the benefit of the community: “The most important thing each of us can
know is our unique gift and how to use it in the world.” “In order for the whole to flourish, each of
us has to be strong in who we are and carry our gifts with conviction, so they can be shared with
others.” The flourishing Three Sisters “provides a visible manifestation of what a community can
become when its members understand and share their gifts.” Together beauty and utility give
rise to mutual flourishing, honoring each and benefiting the whole. Oh, if we could truly live into
such wisdom!

Oh, that we could live as the curious garden, inquisitive and seeking, as well as awe-inspiring in
its lively diversity of form and color, of shape and function. Like plants, the garden simply
appears, and tending to healthy connections enables thriving life to blossom even more. Oh,
that we as a community could provide this for ourselves, provide this as an example to inspire
other communities to such thriving miraculous liveliness! For truly, lives lived in this way are

“miracles as well. Despite our trials and disappointments,” we join together on any Sunday “to
be reminded that all of us have value and all have a place in the beauty of the world. To be
reminded that all are welcome, and all may receive communion from the table of this
[Congregation].” We come because here we choose to celebrate the diversity that is reality, and
we come because we know that our diversity requires covenant, agreements to renew and to
practice, because covenant, not creed, is what holds us together through and because of our
differences. “We come to be a part of something greater than ourselves.”

Within this circle of our kinship where we celebrate, seek kindness, and return friendship, may
our lives bloom. Together, knowing the shimmering threads of connection, manifested in flowers
and more, may our lives bloom in covenant. Within our consciousness that life is re-created
each day, in beauty and with awareness, may our lives, may our life in community bloom with
learning, with happiness, with needs fulfilled.

And so now, let us complete our Flower Ceremony, with a history of our ritual and a practice to
reveal the shimmering threads of connection between us, among us, and beyond us.

Rev. Rita Capezzi