Kanuga Chapel, Leaving Fingerprints, Letting Our Right Brain Be in Charge
“The God who existed before any religion counts on you to make the oneness of the human family known and celebrated.”—Archbishop Desmond Tutu.
The Chapel of Transfiguration at Kanuga Conference Center in North Carolina has always been a place where the family of God is celebrated in diverse ways. I love the chapel's exterior and interior, crafted from southern Carolina white pine from trees downed in a severe storm in 1936.
My mind always wanders as I sit in the chapel, waiting for any service to begin, and I remember more. The wood for the chapel was not pretreated, leaving unusual dark oval markings from the oil in the workers’ fingerprints. The simple prints are more prominent on the ceiling, where it was more difficult for builders to work.
When I am in the chapel, I feel surrounded by the thousands of prayers from people on retreat who have worshiped here and by the hands of those who labored on the building. I remember our own fingerprints and where we leave them, as well as those of others.
I especially remember the day I was sitting in the chapel when I learned that my fingerprints for TSA PreCheck had not been captured clearly enough. That meant there would be a delay in receiving my PreCheck, delaying my traveler number! You carry this identification to go through a special security lane at airports. I realized that it is now physically hard for me to leave fingerprints for the remainder of my life’s journey.
I have a new appreciation for the builders of this chapel, who must have been incredibly strong and would have been tightly gripping the wood to leave their prints in this sacred space.
I remember other services in this chapel that I never wanted to end. I have memories of a preaching conference, dancing around the altar with Barbara Brown Taylor as I offered the bread and she followed with the wine. I see Bishop Tutu dancing on the green after an amazing closing Eucharist at a retreat led by Trinity Wall Street. Priceless. I remember two Lenten retreats when we were snowed in. Breathtaking.
I played my harp at one retreat that Phyllis Tickle led in this chapel because the scheduled musicians could not make it. I also played at the closing of our spiritual direction class at the Hayden Institute—a privilege.
Thin places like Kanuga can offer us an entire album of memories, times when God’s presence and love were palpable—or, as Gordon Cosby would tell us, times when we lived in the real world—or, as Lara Patriquin would tell us, times when our right brains were leading us.
Joanna. https://www.joannaseibert.com/