Seasons in My Garden: Meditations from a Hermitage

Wonderful book! Sr. Elizabeth writes extremely well and relates her everyday life with its up and downs, trials and joys to the spiritual life. The front cover says it all - 'like mini-retreats for the soul'. Read the book slowly and enjoy the progress of seasons in Maine with lovely descriptions of Transfiguration Hermitage. Sr. Elizabeth also describes her personal journey in faith with an openness and honesty that is refreshing and inspiring. I highly recommend this book!

Sister Elizabeth's meditations from a hermitage in Maine compose both a place and a journey. From the flowering and fragrant cloister-garden and her battle with Japanese beetles, to the blueberry barrens and goldenrod and woods of her "prayer trail," to the hard-won acknowledgement of "fear" as a "friend"--Sister Elizabeth's beautifully written and insightful book introduces a friend for a lifetime. --Carolyn Gelland, author of "Dream-Shuttle" and "Four-Alarm House"

I cannot say enough GOOD THINGS about this book! I enjoyed reading it so much and received so much Spiritual benefits from it. Do not miss this wonderful book. All I can say is, "Please write another one!" and "Thank you!"

This was an interesting book of a woman's very special journey of her spiritual calling. It was fascinating.

Mostly highly engaging refledtions that provide a good context for considering my own humanity and place in this world.

beautifully written

Oh, hurray! They've become a book! In the interest of transparency, I should say my family is personally enriched by the spirit of Transfiguration Hermitage. We met Sr. Elizabeth Wagner before the Hermitage, at a seminar on lectio divina and vowed to follow her lectures. We have taken many pictures at the Hermitage, built small pieces of furniture for the retreat house and four times a year help pull together the newsletter. A couple years ago now we were given rough copies of the stories that now appear in Seasons In My Garden to inspire photo shoots over a year. We read and harvested Sr. Elizabeth's beautiful verbal images from the pages and then set out to capture what she had so clearly and lovingly described. And yes, we have a collection used on and off for various publications and events. Her descriptions of the landscape, plants edible and decorative and how they are affected by the seasons are almost as delicious as the fruitcakes baked and sold to finance the activities at the Hermitage. At Transfiguration Hermitage there is a "fruitcake season!" But reading the stories now in Seasons In My Garden - without that specific agenda - I am mesmerized and stunned at the richness and depth I missed when skimming for picture ideas. Sr. Elizabeth has been planted in Maine and these are the stories about how that works. To be living your vocation sounds like a direct route to continuous joy and inspiration. But like all routes, few are straight. Sr. E opens her heart about managing the weeds that crowd joy and inspiration. Raised Protestant, she was gifted by a pull from Catholicism, found and lost community, became a hermit and one day found herself in Maine - it was like Siberia to her, she says. Through the changes brought about by the seasons, Sr. Elizabeth shares how scripture, prayer, work, worries, St. Benedict, meditation, wisdom from the Desert Fathers to Thomas Merton, and lectio impact her life, always with a voice that could be one's very own conscience if one was honest with oneself. Transcending the real garden tasks and cycles, she connects the sacred and the secular with meditations on dirt and manure, solitude, boredom, pretence, barrenness, being different, fear, death, Japanese Beetles, too much rain, unexpected abundance, blizzards and much, much more. Her words and her work have transformed what was Siberia into a place of welcome, support and hospitality. Her insights are new and fresh, even as they have been perennially explored by others over the centuries. She spares us nothing - we have her at her best and at her most vulnerable - even during fruitcake season. Just as meeting Sr. Elizabeth at that first workshop on lectio planted seeds in my heart, Seasons In My Garden has sown a deep respect for how the soil of a soul can be enriched in every season when one attends not only to God's creation, but also to that sometimes sweet and sometimes nagging wee small voice of the heart.

Oh, how I didn’t want this book to end! This unique “wisdom collection” – which should be titled Seasons in the Garden of My Heart – is truly a gift. Each essay is beautifully grounded in the natural world and moves into the depths of the heart in its quest for God. A sanctified earth reminds us that we, too, are sanctified. Sister Elizabeth uses the backdrop of the magnificently rustic and at times harsh Maine environment to craft each wisdom essay into an ascent to the Divine. Her journey often takes her through the wilderness of self-knowledge. The writing offers intricate detail and vast reaches into the depths of both the natural world and the human spirit in its quest for the supernatural. For example, her vision of the delicate rose is “like a chalice, its layers unfolding like the mysteries of the human heart.” She writes of being “clothed by God with the garment of the garden and snuggling into its warm comfort.” Sister Elizabeth has journeyed steadfastly with the Lord through doubt, fear, struggle, pain and hardship, identifying deeply with human nature’s trials and triumphs. She sees intimately into the beauties of the natural world and finds the essence of her spiritual journey in its intricacies. Her writing offers testimony that she witnesses to the Divine in the depths of the human heart. For Sister Elizabeth there is a deeply interwoven connection between nature, human nature and the Divine. I didn’t want this book to end but discovered that it is an invitation for readers to sharpen their senses, and allow themselves to be drawn into the Sacred Presence all around in the natural world, to meet the Divine as they journey deep into their own hearts.

The book is in very good condition, and spiritually very uplifting

Great book, well worth a read