Christ in creation
Photo by Emily Turner, White River National Forest
Christ in creation: A conversation with Kathy Oehler
She loves riding motorcycles with her husband and spending time with her grandchildren.
Kathy Oehler is also a trained spiritual director though she prefers the term spiritual companion, which makes sense considering she’s a former obstetrics nurse, a role where she companioned with many women during their birthing process.
She finds God in nature, during hikes and while she gardens. Writing poetry and essays also connect her to the Divine. She says she longs for presence, for truth and sees Christ in everything.
This didn’t come easy. She had to unknow some things she had been taught before she could know what had been inside of her all along. You can explore the first part of her journey in The Gardner: An Interview with Kathy Oehler on trusting self, trusting God.
These days, Oehler finds herself in more of the knowing phase as opposed to the unknowing. She is learning to trust - to trust God, to trust herself.
Nature has helped.
Long walks provided consistency and healing as she recovered from an injury. Time outside not only brought physical but emotional healing, too.
“Every day I would take a walk, and one day I was walking down my street. There are a lot of trees on our street. I was in this state where I was starting to lose hope that I would ever recover because it was taking so long…
And, then I became aware. I had an awareness of the trees. In a new way, I could feel God’s presence in the trees, His spirit in the trees. Then I heard God. I could hear God’s presence through trees saying ‘All of creation is invested in your healing.”
Oehler paused. She couldn’t walk anymore. She just breathed.
It.
All.
In.
Retreat House Spirituality Center recently visited with Oehler to learn more about this new place of freedom, or the garden, as she calls it. In the garden, she’s found God and deepened her love and appreciation for the natural world and herself.
On behalf of Oehler, we invite you into this sacred space of storytelling to learn more about her healing journey and offer thanks to Oehler for her brave vulnerability as we share her hope that this story might offer solidarity to others.
Retreat House: When we initially visited, you were still in the deconstruction phase of your journey. I know now that you’ve moved into the reconstruction phase some. In our first interview together, you described yourself living in a black and white mansion:
“It is old and it has been neglected. It is my home. It is black and white. I am walking on the grounds which are overgrown, and then I see a beautiful tile with brilliant colors, and I pull back all of the vines and it is sitting there. I see light coming out from all of the corners, and I pick it up and the light comes streaming out.”
Are you still in the mansion?
Oehler: No, I am now in the garden. I am starting to forget what the grey mansion looks like and what it was like to live there. Only when I write about it, do I remember it. It feels like a different season, a different life.
Retreat House: Did you have to do anything to forget what it was like in the mansion?
I had to take a step into this new place, the place I am now. I really struggled with Seminary of the Wild. I struggled with taking the step to enroll. I knew I felt called to do it, but then there was the practical side, the financial side of things that was such a big commitment. I was so deeply in the place of unlearning and deconstructing many of the systems I had been taught in my childhood and most of my adult life that I didn’t have much hope to be any different.
I was meeting with a small group of women, and I was talking to them and sharing my struggle. I was fixated on the financial commitment of Seminary of the Wild. I said I know I am need of healing. My hope is this (Seminary of the Wild) could be healing.
One of the ladies responded:
“If you were physically ill and you knew this could heal you, would you hold back your resources?”
When she asked me that question, I knew in my body. I knew the truth of what I needed to do, so I enrolled in Seminary of the Wild.
Retreat House: What did/does truth feel like? How do you feel it in your body? How do you know?
Oehler: It feels like a release of tension. In the moment of knowing, It felt like freedom. The same freedom I feel on my walks and in nature. I knew I had to enroll.
Retreat House: I looked up a quick definition of Seminary of the Wild: “A nature-based program of encountering the wholeness, depth and mystery of one's nature in the creation.” I can see how this program fits so wonderfully with your faith journey at this junction.
In addition to enrolling, how do you find yourself expressing this new freedom that you’re feeling?
Oehler: I am in a place of exploring the garden. The first module in Seminary of the Wild is called “Wild Earth.” The invitation in this module is to wander in creation being aware and open to the invitation of experiencing God’s presence in creation.
When I had this moment of deep knowing on my walk, I had to stop and pause. I couldn’t walk anymore, I just breathed it all in. I had never experienced God like this. I could feel the companionship of every created thing supporting me in my healing. This feeling came at just the right moment in my journey.
I was visiting with a friend one day on Zoom, and she told me she had enrolled in Seminary of the Wild. I had heard about it from another friend, so when I heard it from a second friend, I connected it with my experience in the trees on my walk. I had been looking for a community of people to support me in this experience and in developing this new faith language as I continued to explore and connect to God in this new way.
Retreat House: What you are describing reminds me of how Richard Rohr describes the Cosmic Christ. I’ll have to look it up. Here it is. He says: “The Cosmic Christ is the Spirit that is embedded in - and makes up - everything in the universe, and Jesus is the embodied version of that Spirit that we can fall in love with and relate to.”
Oehler: Yes, that’s it! I read a verse the other day that I’ve heard my entire life, but I am seeing and hearing it in a new way. It embodies what we are talking about it.
“There is only Christ. He is everything, and He is in Everything.”
Retreat House: Speaking in metaphor, what has it been like for you to journey outside of the grey mansion and into the garden?
Oehler: When I left the mansion, I was able to see the tile in the earth, the tile you and I discussed the last time I visited. I didn’t necessarily go willingly into the garden. I lifted the tile, and I peered down into the garden, but I didn’t choose to go down to it. Instead, I fell down into it. I struck my head when I fell down. It was very disorienting - both physically, emotionally, and spiritually.
There are moments I am afraid I will be taken out of the garden and back in that old grey house. But I know this isn’t true. I still carry a certain rage at the institutions that kept me in the grey mansion. And I have great concern and compassion for those who are living in their own grey mansions.
I also have a lot of grief, a lot of anger - anger for the loss, the loss of all that was taken away from me, and I have asked God to please let me use this in some way to help others, but I don’t know what that looks like yet.
Retreat House: What do you feel was taken away from you during your time in the grey mansion?
Oehler: The feminine side of God was taken away from me. I was only taught to view God in the masculine sense and with masculine language. I now know that God is infinitely bigger than the boxes He was put in. I absolutely did not trust my own inner knowing. I didn’t recognize my own God-given gifts. I didn’t know them, so I didn’t nurture them. I’m just now spending time with the feminine side of God. And there’s a connection between the feminine wound and my gifts.
Photo by Emily Turner, Oak Cliff Nature Preserve
“In looking back and now that I have a deeper knowing of myself and experience, I see that my feminine gifts have been diminished, squashed and denied. I have always been uncomfortable naming my spiritual gifts and talents. Maybe this is part of the feminine wound?”
One reason I love Seminary of the Wild is the invitation to write, to express my knowing. One of the invitations in the most recent module was to write of a place or a created thing that has drawn us to itself. The Wisdom of the Fire Pit was birthed from this prompt.
Retreat House: You are a prolific writer, and we are grateful for all of the work, essays and poetry that you’ve published on the RH blog and in our House of books. I feel like I’m in a position to say, yes, writing is certainly one of your gifts!
What is the significance of the fire pit?
Oehler: I am the fire pit. It moves back and forth between roaring and being quiet. When the fire is quiet, the wood is glowing because the fire has been burning. Before I was in the garden, the fire was burned out. But not anymore. The fire burns now. This is the thing that makes me cry.
I was raised to believe that God was present in the Church. And that the Church held the fullness of God. And God eventually allowed the systems in the Church to be incredibly confining and stifling. It is not that God didn’t speak to me over and over again when I was in those sanctuaries and churches or that God didn’t bring healing to my life in those spaces, but I believe He knew that I wanted more and he wanted more from me.
Retreat House: Now that you are living into this place of wisdom, this Wisdom of the Fire Pit where you write: “And so it came to pass that while humanity was separated from one another in the spring of 2020, I began to beckon, extending an invitation to come outside and play. In late summer, I was created with smooth pea gravel from the river bottoms and bricks to contain the wood fires that were to come. An oak tree and wildflowers became my close companions.”
Such peace and beautiful images. You are finding Christ in creation. How do you feel now about your path, your walk with God?
Oehler: I continue to find myself in places of freedom with more and more experiences of God. Some who don’t share my faith language are concerned that I have walked away from God, but I haven’t. I am finding God in creation.
“Now that I’m outside, I know it is an endless horizon.”
Kathy Oehler’s ministry is to facilitate spiritual and emotional healing through listening, loving presence, prayer and writing in the form of letters from God and poetry. Her journey embraces the mystical path and the cultivation of joy as a spiritual practice. Her hobbies include gardening, hiking, motorcycling, reading and learning a second language. She is currently enrolled in Seminary of the Wild, a program focusing on creation spirituality. She is drawn to finding Christ in nature and looks forward to exploring this space and learning more about God, herself and the world around her. Email Kathy.
Not connecting with the systems and structures of one’s faith tradition any longer can feel like a death and might be played out in different ways. Rev. Dr. Lil Smith, is the founder of Retreat House as well as a Trained Spiritual Director and Supervisor. She describes it like this:
”The outside no longer matches the inside,” Smith says “This can feel disorienting, scary and even traumatic.” Smith, who is also an adjunct professor at Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University, shares that at some point, we all have to be in a space of disorientation, or we aren’t ever going to grow in the ways God is calling us. Trained Spiritual Director Aaron Manes is a covenant partner of Retreat House and host of Reconstruction Calls, a podcast series dedicated to exploring spirituality, the church and personal stories like Oehler’s. You can check out his work here. If you are in need of healing, you are welcome at Retreat House Spirituality Center. Questions or would like to see a spiritual director? Send us a note!
This article was written by Emily Turner. Part of Emily’s ministry and desire is to facilitate spiritual and emotional healing through listening, loving presence, prayer, and writing. She is a trained spiritual director. With both her background in journalism and training in spiritual direction, Emily is a compassionate listener. She asks intuitive questions, gently companioning with those she works with to live into their true selves. Email Emily.