Psalm 104
The Bright Blessed Day, the Dark Sacred Night
Yesterday, I meandered down to the pier at the mouth of the CT River to walk off some pumpkin pie. There wasn’t a soul there except for a diving duck who seemed to be playing hide and go seek in the shallows. The still water lapped quietly at the shore as faded grasses gently swayed in a quiet breeze. I settled onto a bench and thought to myself, “what a wonderful world” …
Poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning thought so, too:
Earth is crammed with heaven
And every bush aflame with God
But only those who see
take off their shoes.
It was a bit too chilly to take off my shoes so I kept walking. Our revitalized Connecticut River and clean Long Island Sound waterways are a success story of environmental stewardship. Nonetheless, our ecosystem remains fragile because of climate change.
From every corner of the earth, we as a global community, are facing the loss of God’s creations at a “devastating rate”. Holy ground has become desecrated, fracked and piled high with human wastefulness and greed.
Current research reports that climate realities are far worse than predicted even ten years ago. They include statistics about rising temperatures beyond the 1.5 Celcius mark due to the unceasing burning of fossil fuels.
According to the report on Climate Change released just last month by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) “Effects from climate change are already happening, and at this point they are inevitable.”
The results are too staggering to take in all at once: thousands of non-human species are disappearing each year, the waters of the deep have become floating oceans of plastic
and two-thirds of coral reefs (which contain the majority of the ocean’s biodiversity) are now bleached beyond saving due to warming temperatures. Glaciers and frozen tundra are retreating changing the habitats for wildlife irreversibly.
On top of that, wildfires and droughts are spreading. We are witnessing afar the tragic loss of human life and wilderness at The Campfires in California still burning.
Overall, the poor and most vulnerable populations are impacted the greatest, affecting economies, fisheries, human health, and public safety worldwide.
Just this past Friday, the US National Climate report was released detailing the climate change impact already harming water, food, and ecosystems in our own country. (It’s worth studying these reports together and harnessing our energies and resources…)
Echoes from the prophet Isaiah ring true:
“The earth lies polluted under its inhabitants,
For they have transgressed laws
Violating statutes
Broken the everlasting covenant.
(Is 24: 5-6)
My first experience of these hard climate realities came on a trip with my family far from our Connecticut shores to one of the 7 Wonders of the World. We were in Dehli, India for a wedding and had a free day to travel to Agra to see the Taj Mahal. Declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site, the Taj, is a 17th-century magnificent mausoleum, described as “the jewel of Muslim art in India.” Supposedly a two-hour journey, it took us 6 hours in smog-filled traffic. Alas, we arrived ten minutes too late and watched the inlaid magnificent gates shut ahead of us. Rickshaw drivers offered to take us behind the Taj for a sunset view.
By this time of day, Agra like New Dehli and many overpopulated cities of the world are filled with a foggy haze of acrid smoke. The thickening air quality is so poor it is hard to see very far. One wears a scarf as a mask to keep from inhaling too much. Climbing out of the rickshaw, the sight behind the Taj was eerie in the setting sun. We stood at the banks of the Yamuna River, polluted by sewage (and declared “ecologically dead” by scientists). Hearing the squish of my sneakers, I look down and saw we were standing on mountains of plastic bags.
Looking up, I craned my neck to see beyond the high walls of the miraculous Taj, hidden by spirals of barbed wire. This was not the view advertised on Trip Advisor. The sight of the poor living in the shadows along the browning walls was also a haunting sight.
Peaks of the famous Taj minarets shone in the light of a rising moon.
I was stunned by both sights, the degradation and at the same time the beauty above us with the night sky sparkling with thousands of stars.
Of course, no one needs to travel 8,000 miles to see the effects of fossil fuels, acid rain and climate change (in fact, a flight that long adds to one’s carbon footprint starkly–a dilemma best left to discuss another day.)
After hearing the latest from the current day science on climate catastrophe, like me you may be wondering:
Is there any good news here?
What can we do that will make a difference?
How shall we live now with this growing body of knowledge?
According to climatologists and environmentalists, “we still have control over how severe these effects become…and how long they will last. “
We have choices to make.
Many of you in our congregation are already dedicated to the Green movement and are activists of conservation, the Land Trust and environmental justice. We thank you and want to follow your lead. Our children, too, are learning in God’s Neighborhood about creation care as part of the curriculum. In addition, we are certified by the Ct Conference of the UCC as a Green Church having met the highest criteria. Amen to all of these vital ministries.
But, as a community among communities all over the world, how do we collectively move from a theology of plunder to a theology of wonder?
How might we rediscover the deep wells of creation spirituality that is our inheritance. Our inheritance from many sources from our Judaeo-Christian roots to the other rich theologies and faith traditions across the world from the Native American to the Celtic to Buddhist teachings and beyond.
In this pluralistic and rich shared world of ours, God knows, we have everything we need for the journey forward whatever the future may bring.
Spending time with the psalmists, poets and artists alike can reorient us to the wonder that surrounds us and teach us reverence and hope for the way forward.
The Bible, itself, holds over a thousand references to the earth and caring for creation. The message is clear: all in God’s creation– nature animals humanity–are mutually connected and full of “goodness”. And, as people of faith, we have a biblical mandate to care for all that God has made.
We hear God’s declaration of goodness in the unfolding days of Genesis the accounts, and how God looks back and… “saw everything that God had made, and indeed, it was very good.” (v. Gen 1.31)
In Psalm 104 today, we are given a lyric of praise right out of the Book of Creation.
“You set the earth on its foundations
so that it shall never be shaken.
You cover it with the deep as with a garment;
the waters stood above the mountains”
God is thanked for making order out of chaos, beauty out of nothingness. The writer reveals an understanding that human beings are a part of the whole of the universe — not the center of the story.
Reverence gushes from every line as the poet talks to God. “How manifold are your works!” (v24)
Thomas Berry, the prophetic priest and eco-theologian who passed away in 2009, taught in his writings decades ago about the need for us to adjust our hearts, minds and actions. Compellingly, Berry said we are living in an Ecological Age. And our actions and communion with the life systems of our one planet remain essential to the survival of all…. this is our greatest challenge.
“What is needed is an adjustment of relationship namely OUR relationships with our natural world, with the universe
The basic issue before us is not human-divine relations or inter-human relations but human-Earth relations.”
Our psalmist would agree I think.
As would the Green Mystic of the 12th c
Hildegard of Bingen from Germany.
Ahead of her time theologically, Hildegard spoke of the greening of God (viriditas) inherent in the created garden of the world.
She predicted:
“We shall awaken from our dullness and rise vigorously toward justice, if we fall in love with creation deeper and deeper, we will respond to its endangerment with passion.”
We have choices to make as a people of God, as a family of faith, as global citizens of this hurting planet. How shall we…you, me- answer the charge before us remembering as our Native American forebears have taught us that “the earth does not belong to us, we belong to the earth”.
So, seek out a mystic, one from our history or from your own backyard
Keep a poem in your back pocket for the hard days,
Read a gospel from start to finish,
And listen to Louis Armstrong croon so that you, too
will walk in the light of the full moon
And give thanks for the bright blessed day, the dark sacred night.
Then…then, together
We can take up the urgent task of climate care that awaits us tomorrow.
One more thing!
On the drive to New Hampshire for Thanksgiving, one of my brothers saw a fully grown bear eating lunch on the side of the highway on Rt. 91. Mary Oliver’s psalm came to mind:
Somewhere a black bear
has just risen from sleep
and is staring
down the mountain.
All night
in the brisk and shallow restlessness…
I think of her,
her four black fists
flicking the gravel,
her tongue
like a red fire
touching the grass,
the cold water.
There is only one question:
how to love this world.
There is only one question:
how to love this world.
—
The Rev. Laura Fitzpatrick-Nager