“Each creature possesses its own particular goodness and perfection… Each of the various creatures, willed in its own being, reflects in its own way a ray of God’s infinite wisdom and goodness.”
Catechism of the Catholic Church, 339.
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As part of our continuing effort to learn about the plants, insects and birds on our church’s grounds, we picked the olive tree as the Creation Care Plant of the Month for January. What we learned about the olive made us stop and consider history, because humans have had a valuable relationship with the olive for a long, long time.
Olive trees are first recorded to have been cultivated 5,000 years ago, in Crete and Syria, and then throughout the Mediterranean. They came to the Americas from Spain, arriving in Peru in the 16th century. From there, they spread north, and were brought to Mexico and then California by the Franciscan missionaries. The mission in the San Diego is the first place olives are thought to have been grown in California, beginning in the 1700’s.
Not only do olives have a long record as a species, but the individual trees themselves can have impressive histories. Their lifespan is 300 – 600 years.
What do you think an olive tree might witness in that amount of time?
At THNJ, we have olive trees at both of our church sites.
We should see them begin to bloom with small, white flowers in the spring, and produce fruit beginning in late summer.
Until then, we're wishing you a Happy Monday!
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Be praised, my Lord, through our sister Mother Earth, who feeds us and rules us, and produces various fruits with colored flowers and herbs.
from the Canticle of the Sun, St Francis of Assisi