your soul in neglect

This local eyesore never fails to arrest my attention whenever I walk by it. Until now, I never thought to take a picture of it, because, of course, it's so ugly. But the other day, I happened to have my camera in hand, and the scene suggested something beyond itself. Thinking it over today, I decided that while "neglect" may be an apt title for the photo, that something that it points to is, in my view, the human soul neglected.

Once that connection was made, another sprang to mind; Christopher West's analogy in many of his Theology of the Body speeches, about fallen human nature being like cars with flat tires. You can't go fast or far, and you certainly can't enjoy the trip if your car has even one flat tire. But hemmed in by underbrush and nearly reclaimed by nature, I'm afraid this car--call it a combination of fallen nature and long personal neglect of one's own soul--won't be going anywhere on its own power again.

While it lies covered in leaves and tangled branches, it will always be an anomaly. Though it may host any number of wild creatures, it will never be a mere mound of earth or a rotting stump. It was made to drive.

And the human spirit was made to soar.