Sister Elizabeth Thoman was blindsided by a spiritual side effect of chemotherapy treatment for breast cancer in 2004. A Sister of the Humility of Mary (Iowa) since 1964, she found it difficult to pray.

"Cancer treatment just takes all the stuffing out of you," explained the retired founder of the Center for Media Literacy, a national non-profit organization she led for over 30 years in west Los Angeles. "Words jumble together; concentration is gone. Just when I needed prayer the most, it eluded me."

One day while resting, she picked up a book of nature photographs. As she turned the pages of one glorious scene after another, the 64-year-old religious sister felt an overwhelming sense of being enveloped by God.

"I found myself turning my heart and mind to God. I was praying [and] delirious with joy," said Sister Thoman. She described the experience as "one of those events in life that transforms you forever."

During her recovery --- she has been cancer-free for three years now --- she picked up a digital camera she had bought but never used. She began taking close-up pictures of flowers, drawing on photojournalism skills learned in college. Soon, her photos, which have been likened to the work of painter Georgia O'Keeffe, drew attention from admiring friends.

A neighbor who had been in sterile isolation for three weeks for a bone marrow transplant said she wished she could have had some flower photos at her hospital bedside. "A light bulb went off in my head," said Sister Thoman.

Having personally experienced how illness can harm people's ability to function, she embarked on her "Healing Petals/Images for Prayer and Reflection" ministry to bring affordable beauty to those in physical or emotional pain and to inspire new ways to image the Divine.

A recent exhibition of flower prints at her father's parish in Nashville, Tenn., drew enthusiastic response, with one woman buyer confiding in a letter, "It has a calming effect when I look at it." Inspiring a peaceful calm in patients who are having their blood pressure taken is the reason a medical care facility has four of Sister Thoman's prints hanging in the office.

"When you're sick, you feel assaulted," said Sister Thoman. "Chemotherapy chemicals are toxic. You feel like a truck's run over you. [Contemplating] beauty is a relief and a release. It helps you balance by helping you relax."

And, she adds, reflecting on beautiful images of God's creation can inspire prayer. "The whole idea of praying with images is kind of a new idea, but it really fits. Images go straight to the emotional part of the brain. They bypass the cognitive side. Normally when we pray, we're very cognitive, so when an ill person's cognitive field is limited, the images can inspire a prayerful response, similar to what happens when people contemplate icons."

Helping people to image God as a nurturing creator is another reason for Sister Thoman's Healing Petals ministry. "The idea of God as the creator of beauty touches souls and gives people hope. I hope people seeing these pictures will be able to touch God in a new way," said Sister Thoman.

On June 1, Holy Family Bookstore at Holy Family Church in South Pasadena will hold an exhibition of Healing Petals flower photographs from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. Sister Thoman will be present for the opening day exhibition at the bookstore, which will carry her framed prints and collections of flower greeting cards for the next several months.

Proceeds from the sale of the framed prints, ranging from $10-45, support free placement of photographs with low-income cancer patients, the elderly and infirm. Holy Family Bookstore is located at 1519 Fremont Ave., South Pasadena.