Behold the Beautiful

Sometimes when something ugly happens, I think one of the best things we can do is turn our gaze to beauty. 

There's something transcendent about feasting with our eyes and filling our minds with as much as beauty as we can hold so that it brims over and flows into our souls. 

Last week from my office window I watched a cavalcade of media trucks, parked one after the other, reporting on the devastating events of Orlando. The streets I travel every day were eerily empty of traffic yet filled with intense commotion.

I work on the communications team for the hospital where many of the injured patients were treated.

I walked out to the corner with my colleagues to check out the scene and saw hordes of cameras and tangled cords and studio lights.

Reporters from national and international news organizations stood under tents while staffers held fans to make them look as if they weren’t sweltering on our first 94-degree day of the summer. 

When we returned to our office, we passed more of our coworkers heading out to the scene. One of the managers told us to take off our hospital badges so the media wouldn’t see who we worked for and ask us any questions about the conditions of the patients.

It hadn't occurred to us to take off our ID badges, but that’s not what happened while we walked among the media tents. 

When people saw we worked for the hospital, they wanted to do something for us.

A funeral home official told us they wanted to offer their services at no charge to the families of patients. 

A group pulling a wagon full of bottled water offered us water. When we declined, they insisted, expressing their appreciation.

At the deli where I often take out lunch, the cashier told me all week long she’d taken calls from places like Boston and Newtown, Connecticut. 

She said people ordered $800 and $1,000 worth of sandwiches and asked for them to be offered to the media and hospital staff and everyone who was out on the street just doing their job. 

I thought about how generous people’s hearts were. 

And then I remembered why they were here.

And that’s why we need beauty.

Beauty is a soul-restorer and heart-healer. 

Last summer I traveled to Bellagio, Italy, for a faith and art retreat. 

I’ve shared many of the photos I captured here on my blog, but Cathy Walters, a professional photographer from Denver, traveled with our group. She offered some of her official photos to us as a keepsake, and her expert eye captured the loveliness of Italy.

So I’m sharing them here with you. 

Because I'm not sure what you're looking at these days, but maybe like me, you might want to behold a little bit of beauty.

There was rich beauty in the landscape of Italy, the rugged mountains, and lush hillsides beside the ancient buildings.

There was peaceful beauty on the waters and in the surging waves churned up by the boats. 

There was luscious beauty in the food of the region and in the ripe, gorgeous gardens. 

There was a harmonious beauty in the new friends I met, imaginative beauty in the art we created, and spiritual beauty in the prayers we shared together on our last day of the retreat.

If you are feeling discouraged, disheartened or overwhelmed just now, I hope you gaze on what captivates your heart with beauty.

Until you’re filled up to overflowing.

{All Italy photos in this post are by Cathy Walters Photography.} 

I'm having coffee with my friends at Holley Gerth's place at Coffee for your Heart. Join me there for more posts from my blogger friends!