“This is our hope: that the children born today may still have, twenty years hence, a bit of green grass under their bare feet, a breath of clean air to breathe, a patch of blue water to sail upon, and a whale on the horizon to set them dreaming.”
How many of you can remember the first “Earth Day”? It was April 22, 1970. How many of you took part in it? How many of you were not yet born?
Somehow it’s been 53 years since then, and while much has changed it still feels like the prophets giving witness on behalf of the earth, humanity and all life are not being heeded. Those ancient Hebrew Bible prophets could empathize and feel our pain.
Still, there are so many communities working towards health and sanity, justice and the salvation of planetary life. Ours is among them, thanks to our Climate Justice Team which Karen Martin has been leading for so many years. Our Unitarian Universalist faith challenges the medieval concepts of a 3-tiered, earth-centered, human-centered universe- as well as an anthropomorphic white deity, objectified nature and alienation from the web of life. We specifically and intentionally call upon the wisdom of earth-centered religious traditions to confront worn-out and dangerous religious ideas and to positively offer us a sense of interconnectedness, belonging, love and grounding. Sunday’s guest preacher Claire-Karl Muller, who is the lead for Indigenous Solidarity at UU Mass Action, will be speaking to this.
May we remember…
“Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy.” – Rabbi Abraham Heschel
“All are nothing but flowers in a flowering universe.”- Nakagawa Soen-Roshi
“I entrust myself to the earth; Earth entrusts herself to me.” – Thich Nhat Hanh
Happy Earth Day. Of course, as they say, every day is Earth Day.
Yours in faith,
Rev. Lee