Earth Day at 50

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Earth, Earth Day, life, Mother Earth, psalm 8, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

On this 50th anniversary of the first Earth Day, I could sit all day today looking at photos and videos from NASA or taking photos myself outside my house where forsythia like ours could light up the world with their brilliant yellow! I could take a short walk outside once every hour to feel the exhilaration of fresh air as I stepped out the door. I could take a break to praise God for the loveliness of the world each time the wind outside caught the sun peeking out and then running across my bedroom floor. I could (and plan to) transplant the beautiful cuttings of my Prayer Plant (That is her real name; look it up!) that I have been nurturing along for awhile or attend to my Christmas cactus that deserves a more spacious home.

In the midst of a serious crisis, it is always good to stop and remember what is still good about this life on Earth. Today, if we can do nothing more, we should at least give thanks for and to the Earth, our home. Raise your arms or at least your eyes to the expanse of Her. Bend your body in a bow or at least a nod to the wonder of Her. Sing a song or at least call to mind a line of praise – (Psalm 8, for example) in thanks to the One who made Her.

Celebrate Earth and then make a new or renewed commitment to care for her because She is, indeed, Mother to us all.

The World's Turning

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cycles, Earth, healing, positive energy, spring, Spring Equinox, St. Joseph, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

The spring equinox was early and totally missed by me this year! While I was busy trying to celebrate St. Joseph’s feast day (3/19), the earth was sending out messages of new birth and energy. It took until this morning for me to feel it and I had to verify it by looking at my calendar. Now I know why the daffodils are straining to open after their surprise breakthrough along the side of our house two weeks ago.

I plan to go outside today and stand in the midst of all that is natural: the greening of the grass, the calling of the birds, the freshness of the breeze (still somewhat chilly) and feel the hope of healing for the earth rise up to give me courage in this moment when all but the most essential workers have been charged to stay home. With this remembrance of the cycles of life happening in concert with or in spite of us, I hope to add to the positive energy and learn the lessons so important to us all.

The Gift of Frost

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breathe, Earth, forgiveness, heal the world, heaven, John Philip Newell, land, love, love of life, love of neighbors, Peace, prayer, Praying With the Earth, self, souls, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

7:40AM. There’s something about the drop to just beyond freezing temperatures outside (26 F.) that silences me as if the earth put a finger to her lips saying, “Shh…Pay attention. Don’t move from where you sit. Just drink in the moment!” I would love to open my window and breathe in the freshness but I’m afraid that would be just a little too extreme for such an exercise right now. So I sit ensconced in the comfort of the chair that is slowly molding itself to my body, feeling the air around me. It’s cold enough to make me know I have made the right decision but warm enough to give thanks for the heat that rises from downstairs and allows me to concentrate on the prayer for Saturday morning in John Philip Newell’s book, Praying with the Earth: A Prayerbook for Peace. Won’t you join me?

To the home of peace, to the field of love, to the land where forgiveness and right relationship meet we look, O God, with longing for earth’s children, with compassion for the creatures, with hearts breaking for the nations and people we love. Open us to visions we have never known, strengthen us for self-givings we have never made, delights with a oneness we could never have imagined, that we may truly be born of You makers of peace.

May the love of life fill our hearts. May the love of earth bring joy to heaven. May the love of self deepen our souls. May the love of neighbor heal our world. As nations, as peoples, as families this day may the love of life heal our world.

Who Do We Think We Are?

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dominion, Earth, Genesis, Laudato Si, protect the Earth, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, till and keep

As we wait for news of the path that Hurricane Dorian will take today, praying that the report of the strength now of the storm as a “category 5” as it approaches the Bahamas will change, I read a passage from Laudato si, (On Care for our Common Home), the extraordinary treatise on creation and climate change by Pope Francis. It is without doubt “a cautionary tale” and it calls each of us to action, hoping it is not too late. Let us ponder his words.

67. We are not God. The earth was here before us and it has been given to us. This allows us to respond to the charge that Judeo-Christian thinking, on the basis of the Genesis account which grants man “dominion” over the earth (cf. Gen. 1:28) has encouraged the unbridled exploitation of nature by painting him as domineering and destructive by nature.

This is not a correct interpretation of the Bible as understood by the Church. Although it is true that we Christians have at times incorrectly interpreted the Scriptures, nowadays we must forcefully reject the notion that our being created in God’s image and given dominion over the earth justifies absolute domination over other creatures.

The biblical texts are to be read in their context, with an appropriate hermeneutic, recognizing that they tell us to “till and keep” the garden of the world (cf. Gen 2:15).”Tilling” refers to cultivating, ploughing or working, while “keeping” means caring, protecting, overseeing and preserving. This implies a relationship of mutual responsibility between human beings and nature. Each community can take from the bounty of the earth whatever it needs for subsistence, but it also has the duty to protect the earth and ensure its fruitfulness for coming generations.

Earth in Crisis

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crisis, disturbing, Earth, earthquakes, Holy One, John Philip Newell, Prayer of Awareness, Praying With the Earth, recycled, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

We who live in this blessed region of our vast country watch with concern this week the news of earthquakes in California (Are they the harbinger of “the Big One?”) and flash flooding in the nation’s capital, while at the same time giving thanks for the minor inconveniences that we encounter close to home. “Disturbing” is certainly a word that we might use to describe our feelings about what is happening to the Earth, our home, but we should next be asking how we are complicit in the degradation and what we are doing to counteract it.

There has been a commercial on television lately about Rothy’s shoes, made out of recycled plastic. A person twists a plastic water bottle in her hands and it turns into a shoe and then there are all sorts of pictures of shoes. I couldn’t imagine that the message they were conveying was actually about plastic becoming wearable shoes so – of course – I went on the internet to do some research and, believe me, whoever had the idea certainly did their homework. Not only shoes but now clothing is being made from the huge amount of plastic that we discard each day. Statistics are mind-boggling as are the concepts of what can be done with what we throw away.

The lack of concern for the earth is monumental and shame should be our only reaction as we see pictures of the debris being scooped up from the oceans and littering our highways. I am somewhat calmed by the efforts of creative people like the Rothy’s company leaders but the earthquakes this week have (pardon the word) shaken me awake and hopefully have done the same for many people.

I know that much work has to be done and I can only hope I will enter the realm of the active reformers, doing my part in conscious and responsible citizenship. This morning, however, I have decided it might also be time to use John Philip Newell’s book, Praying with the Earth, as a consciousness-raising tool for my morning and/or night prayer. Today’s offering includes the following Prayer of Awareness. (I write it as a stream with few stops to accentuate the urgency of its message to the Holy One.)

It is in the depths of life that we find you at the heart of this moment at the centre of our soul deep in the earth and its eternal stirrings. You are the Ground of all being the Well-Spring of time Womb of the earth the Seed-force of stars. And so at the opening of this day we wait not for blessings from afar but for You the very Soul of our soul the early Freshness of morning the first Breath of day. (p. 18)

Creation Speaks

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climate change, Earth, listen, psalm 19, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, work

I clicked on my phone this morning to see what time it was and was greeted with a Washington Post article on climate change, the result of a wide-ranging study with dire predictions. If I had harbored any hesitations about the legitimacy of such news, they would certainly have been quelled by the scholarship of the report. For me, however, it was just more evidence of what has been patently obvious over several years of watching what is happening to Earth, our Mother. The clearest conclusion in the study is that humans are responsible for the underlying causes of much of what is happening and it is up to us to work toward reform in our use and abuse of the goods of the earth.

As I read, I heard Psalm 19 echoing in my head and heart and I was struck by a question forming in response. Listen, please!

The heavens declare the glory of God and the skies proclaim the work of God’s hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. They have no speech; they use no words; no sound is heard from them. Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the end of the world…(vs. 1-4)

Are we listening?

Holy Ground

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autumn, beauty, Earth, God, ground, growth, life, Mary Schneider CSJ, nourishment, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

As the temperature struggled to get up to 60 degrees (F) yesterday, I walked outside and noticed also that it was time to cut back plants that had flowered so beautifully, yet briefly, earlier in the summer. It feels already as if the autumn is upon us although the prediction is that we may return to milder temperatures in the coming week, as is often the case – ironically – when children return to school. I feel as if being outside tending to the earth would be a noble and restorative occupation today.

I was encouraged in that determination by a prayer by Mary Schneider, CSJ in a reflection booklet produced by my religious community, a welcome gift on this Saturday morning. Mary offers the following blessing:

May God, the Ground of All Being, the Ground that gave you life and nourished your growth, help you realize that you are fruit of the ground in which you grew. You reflect this ground, bringing special gifts and beauty into the world. May you realize, too, that each person, each living, growing thing, also reflects the Ground and colors the world with unique gifts and beauty.

God, Ground of All being, fill us with appreciation of all growing things – their variety of shapes, sizes, textures, intricate patterns and colors.. May this beauty help us accept the diversity in all human beings and allow us to acknowledge the gift of ourselves, the gift that life is, counting each person as part of the earth filled with the goodness of God.

 

 

 

 

 

Hyperbole

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behavior, compassion, consciousness, Earth, evolution, religion, responsibility, sacrifice, science, servant, suffer, sympathize, Teilhard de Chardin, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Yesterday I was in a wide-ranging conversation about elements of a future world that would not only include acceptable behavior of all citizens but also be compassionate toward all creatures and to the universe itself. It seemed that we have a long way to go toward consciousness if we are, in fact, to even approach the possibility of such a world. One element that we saw as necessary was the responsibility of each one of us to move the world toward that goal.

This morning I read a prayer written by Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955), the French Jesuit paleontologist whose writings integrate science and religion in a way that sees evolution as not only a reality but a responsibility of all of us. It seems he is ready to take the lead in accepting his role in this endeavor where compassion is the foundation of the effort. Although he sounds somewhat haughty about his position in such a process, it seems we would all do well to act from a position of the broadest vision in order to “kick start” our enthusiasm and assure at least some progress in our time. Here is what he said in his Prayer for Compassion:

Oh God, I wish from now on to be the first to become conscious of all that the world loves, pursues and suffers: I want to be the first to seek, to sympathize, and to suffer; the first to unfold and sacrifice myself, to become more widely human and more nobly of the earth than any of the world’s servants. (Hearts on Fire – Praying with the Jesuits, p. 107)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Restless Wind

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Earth, fileds, hearts, home, mother nature, Native Americans, natural world, oneness, relatives, rivers, Sister Wind, skies, St. Francis of Assisi, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, trees, weather, wind

As light comes outside my window this morning I wake up to the fact that what sounded like a truck or a train passing by (no tracks here though…) was the wind. It’s as if the tree in my sight line is keening after a tragedy – as well she might, given the destruction yesterday in the Midwestern states where winds reached 165 mph, leaving whole towns in a shambles. When we used to say that “March comes in like a lion and out like a lamb,” we never dreamed of that kind of extreme force. It was just a way to characterize the vicissitudes of mother nature trying to birth the season of spring. It seems that by now, with all the talk about climate change and the advances in science, we would be shouldering more responsibility toward “Sister Wind,” as St. Francis used to call her.

I am not a scientist, by any stretch of the imagination, but this morning I cannot ignore what is right before my eyes. I do not understand why we in the Northeast are so lucky as to be virtually unscathed by the weather events that have been happening in different parts of our country over the past year or two. I’m sitting here watching our tree struggle as the refrain of a 1960’s song plays in my mind: The wayward wind is a restless wind, a restless wind that yearns to wander, and he was born the next-of-kin…the next-of-kin to the wayward wind.

Call me silly, but what if we were to consider all of the natural world as our relatives – as St. Francis and the Native Americans always did? Would we perhaps take better care of our trees and rivers and fields and skies? Would we heed the environmentalists a bit more seriously and be more gentle on our walk through this world? It seems to me that all of this follows from my reflections of yesterday about the necessity of recognizing that even now we can open our hearts a bit wider to the possibility of the oneness of all that exists, thereby taking a bit more responsibility for our actions toward Earth, our home.

 

 

 

 

 

 

With Full Voice

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A Song Welcoming the Holy One, communication, Creator, Earth, holy name, liturgy, living God, Lynn Bauman, power, praise, psalm 96, psalms, singing, splendor, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, universe, wonders

The suggestion of a commentary on Psalm 96, subtitled by author Lynn Bauman A Song Welcoming the Holy One, is that readers experiment with singing rather than saying it because singing is a “vehicle for communication with God.” While this is the rightful presentation of psalms in liturgy, I don’t often think of it as a mode of private prayer. I just tried it – in the privacy of my own room, of course – and the result was less than stellar. I have to admit, however, that I didn’t prepare; I just sang it “cold” without thought of the meaning, phrasing, timing or cadence. (Hmmm…that sounds as if I have some idea of musicality. Don’t be fooled!) My attempt was quite timid, but I must say it had the potential to open the words to me in a more vibrant way than if I had spoken the text. Perhaps I’ll give it another try. Should you be moved to join me from afar, here are the words I was tentatively offering as morning praise to the Creator of the universe.

Come, sing to God, O earth, sing out this song anew. And bless God’s holy name in praise, for day to day we are renewed, restored, refreshed again by glory’s light. Proclaim good news among the nations of the earth, tell all the peoples everywhere God’s work, God’s ways, the wonders that God does. For you can never add the holy One to any list of gods who are but idols made, projections of our thoughts and needs, creations of our hands. For it is the living God we know and praise who made us all and put in place the canopy of stars and space and filled the earth. O, the beauty of your presence, God! O, the splendor and the power in which you dwell!