"It felt like we were being held."
Meher Mount
Your Friday photo is a video…
“It was the closet thing to a church,” said Billy and Pamela Goodrum, talking about choosing to be married under Baba’s Tree.
“Getting Married Under Baba’s Tree” is an outtake (a scene filmed for a movie but not included in the final version) from the award-winning documentary film Tree of Fire: A Story of Love and Resilience.
“I think once we were all under the tree having this ceremony, it felt like we were being held.”
“Getting Married Under Baba’s Tree”
Billy: When it came time to get married, it just seemed like the place to get married.
Pamela: I mean, having a ceremony outside under a tree in nature, it is fundamentally different than being in a building or sitting in a pew or someplace.
You have all of this sensory input. So everybody felt, I think, part of it; held by the tree and really part of this ceremony.
Billy: The tree provides a boundary, provides a little shelter, provides a perimeter of the branches there. And we went in one way and did the ceremony and went out another way. And went on the other side of the tree so we could, everybody could see the point.
You know, my family, her family, people that had never been there and got to experience something. I mean, because it's a spectacular place.
Pamela: But I think once when we were all under the tree having this ceremony, it felt like we were being held.
Like we were being held and surrounded by something. Ideally, that's what you experience when you marry another person is you feel as you're being held and surrounded and carried by your community and by something bigger when you're joining your lives together. And I think that tree really provided that.
~Pamela & Billy Goodrum, Resident Caretakers 1999-2002
Tree of Fire: A Story of Love and Resilience
This award-winning documentary about Baba’s Tree at Meher Mount is a story of heartfelt story of loss, survival, and spiritual connection. After a devastating fire, a once-thriving massive oak – blessed by Avatar Meher Baba – rises from the ashes to offer love and solace.
Against all odds, volunteers worked together to nurture the tree back to health.
The survival of Baba’s Tree becomes a living symbol of resilience and Divine love. Through personal testimonies and breathtaking imagery, the film invites you to rediscover your own capacity for healing, transformation, and spiritual awakening.