CHRISTIAN VIEWPOINT: To encounter the wild is to come back changed
A new Christian retreat centre has just opened at Kilmalieu on the Ardgour peninsula. The first event is a birdwatching retreat including contemplative worship, birdwatching walks, and reflections on birds in the Bible.
The centre, run by the Abernethy Trust and managed by Steve Aisthorpe and his wife Liz may be new, but the location is an ancient place of prayer. ‘Kilmalieu’ means ‘Moluag’s cell’, where the Saint who spread Christian faith across the northern Highlands came to pray in solitude, away from his monastery on the island of Lismore.
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The Kilmalieu estate covers 3000 acres, including coastline and mountain tops and rich rainforest environment. Steve and Liz’s vision is for it to be ‘a place of stillness, enabling people to reflect, focus less on doing and more on being, knowing themselves to be in the loving gaze of God.’
Visiting the centre, as individuals or in groups we can pause to notice, to take a good look at the natural world using both binoculars and magnifying glass. “I’m astounded at the beauty of this place,” says Zac Wright, a member of the Kilmalieu team.
And we may encounter God there in the wild place as we walk in the footsteps of Moluag, not only discovering that we are in God’s ‘loving gaze’, but moved to worship, returning that gaze.
We may discover in nature metaphors of our relationship with God. Steve writes of the patience of the birdwatcher, spending hours crouched in the hide for just one brief, stupendous glimpse of the elusive species. He comments, deep in winter, that even in the darkest of days there are always ‘shafts of light breaking through somewhere’.
He watches the restless torrent of a fast-flowing burn, and notices the quiet eddies in which some of the water lingers for a time. And I love his reflection on the thaw at winter’s end, a reminder ‘of the great Thaw and the ultimate Spring: the Lord’s return and the restoration of all things’.
These experiences equip us to live as God’s beloved people. And part of that involves what the Kilmalieu team are also doing - working in partnership to conserve and restore the creation in which God is so clearly seen.
To encounter the wild is to come back changed. Steve is no stranger to wild walks with Jesus. Last year, on a hike, he sensed God saying to him that his adventure-loving heart had grown too cautious. As a result Steve left the job he loved, relocated with Liz, and in time the Kilmalieu vision came into being.
Going into the wild, we too may hear that loving voice which drew Moluag to Lismore, Steve and the team to Kilmalieu.
You can find out about Kilmalieu at www.abernethy.org.uk/kilmalieu/ or by emailing kilmalieu@abernethy.org.uk
