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Scandals, sequoias, high intensity fire, and Benjamin William Hastings’ album

I think I’ve listened to the song “Seasons” by Benjamin William Hastings hundreds of times, it’s been near the top of my playlist of christian songs for years.

Today someone introduced me to Benjamin William Hasting’s 2022 self titled album, and it’s so good.

It’s beautifully written, and engages with a rich faith without being a “church worship” album. It’s artful and self reflective, and dances between faith and parenting and creativity and vulnerability and probably more, rather than just being songs sung to God.

One of the songs “Cathedrals of the Nelder Grove” jumped out at me.

It’s talking about his response to scandal in his church. And in the third verse, he references back to his song “Seasons”, and the lessons we can learn from Sequoia trees, again:

You know, I’ve sang before about sequoias
I guess we’re more than just one song alike
But as I sit and mourn here in the garden
Indulge me please, just one more time
We tower high above our brothers
We reign the sky, but for a time
Alas, we serve beneath the soil
Where our death just makes a way for life

And after that, the song samples a recording of an ecologist talking about Sequoias in the Nelder Grove in California after a massive fire in 2017.

We’re here right now in the railroad fire of, of 2017 where four years ago, um, in the Nelder Grove of Giant Sequoias. And, and right now we’re standing in an area that burned at low intensity.

Uh, the fire burned in a mix like all wildfires do. It was mostly low and moderate intensity. But there was a portion that burned at high intensity as well.

And the interesting thing, and for me as an ecologist, the important thing is that in the low intensity fire areas, there is no giant sequoia reproduction, none. None from before the fire, none after the fire.

Because what they need for that is high intensity fire, in other words, it’s fire that’s intense enough that it actually will kill some of the mature giant sequoias. But what you get in the bargain is hundreds of times more giant sequoias

It’s striking and I wanted to share these follow up videos: him talking about the song.

And the original video he sampled, at the time I’m posting this still with less than 2000 views:

This is one of those times nature offers such a striking metaphor for human experience that I’m unlikely to forget it.

This is heartwarming.

I don’t mind saying this as a scientist. I love seeing this.

This gives me a lot of hope for the future.

Ecologist Chad Hanson

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