Words of Light and Hope from Tony Foottit

Words of Light and Hope from Tony Foottit.
Hawthorn.
On May Day people used to celebrate the Green Man, the joyful spirit of
nature. He represents springtime and risen life after the dying of winter.
Besides giving his name to some pubs, the Green Man is often carved in
churches and cathedrals. This is an example of the ‘baptism’ of pagan
spirits and festivals.
Hawthorn is used for hedges. The Green Man is often wreathed in hawthorn. Gardens and fields need
walls, fences and hedges. Good
hedges make good neighbours. They are also, together with headlands
and verges, important refuges and corridors for wildlife, including threatened hedgehogs. Unlike a barren
wall or fence a hedge is alive.
That is why hawthorn is called quick when it is planted as a hedge. You can eat the green leaf-shoots in
spring. Children used to call them bread and cheese. The hawthorn blossoms in May which is why it is
often called
May. The berries are called haws. There’s an old saying, Many haws, many sloes, many cold toes: a lot of
berries are a sign of a hard winter to come.
There is a beautiful legend that Joseph of Aramatheia came to Glastonbury
and stuck his hawthorn staff into the ground. It grew and flowered at
Christmas. The hawthorn at Glastonbury still flowers at Christmas as well
as in May. Without boundaries and patterns in their lives people do not
blossom and flourish. The market has become not just a god but God.
Market economy is the new religion. Supermarkets are its cathedrals and churches, shopping its
sacraments, and advertising its sermons. Everyone
has become subservient to the economy. It was President Truman who,
when asked many different questions used to say, It’s economy stupid,
as if economics ruled everything. But economics literally mean
household management. Mankind is responsible for his affairs and
needs to manage them instead of letting them manage him.
May Day is also the feast of St. Philip and St. James.
From A Calendar of Wild Flowers.