Midweek Faith Lift
May 1, 2019
Mother Earth Our Island Home
Rev. Deb Hill-Davis
Today we are celebrating Earth Day at Unity of Ames. The actual designated Earth Day, April 22, was practically on the heels of Easter this year and somehow that seems very appropriate to me. On Easter Sunday, we linked the crucifixion/resurrection experiences as powerful forms of redemption and renewal that lift us higher in consciousness. This week we can apply that same model to the Earth. Clearly as science tells us, the earth is experiencing a wide variety of crucifixion type experiences. And as we noted last week, when those experiences lead to redemptive suffering, then there is the possibility of awakening, of true transformation. And as we also noted, there is no such thing as redemptive violence; it is truly a dead end.
The ever-renewing cycles of life, which we note through the seasons and the awakening Earth in the springtime, remind us that life is a continuously evolving process, one of crucifixion and redemption, transformation. Let our intention today, for Earth Day, be to hold the possibility for the suffering of the earth to be redemptive. As we experience the floods, the storms, the pollution, the natural consequences of our collective actions on this earth, let us hold space for a global awakening of the sacredness of our relationship to Mother Earth, our Island Home.
First let’s remember how Earth Day got started.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCpyezqtci0
Now, here in 2019 we feel the innocence of that initial intention, the purity of it as in 1970, we held a collective consciousness of intentionality to be in a more sacred relationship with the earth. It was the beginning of our awareness of the complexity of our relationship with the earth and quite frankly, with each other. It looked so clear and easy back in 1970, but that has clearly not been the case.
Our essential premise is that we are in relationship with Mother Earth, our Island home. In this relationship we have with Mother Earth, clearly, both parties have free will. One of my favorite thinkers and writers is Sir John Polkinghorne, who is both a nuclear physicist and an Episcopalian priest. He brings together the knowledge of science and the mystery of Spirit, and where they meet is the deepest mystery. We are in a relationship of mystery with Spirit and with the Earth; it is a mirror of our Divine/Human journey.
When people lament about earthquakes and other natural disasters, Sir John Polkinghorne’s response was to remind us that the Universe also has free will and does what it does, not as punishment but as the expression of the nature of the earth itself. It is the nature of tectonic plates of the earth to slip, which results in earthquakes and tsunamis that result in human suffering. To me that seems like the natural consequences of our human interactions and relationships in which we experience suffering as a result of our human nature.
At the core of all of this is the true question of our relationships with each other as we struggle to honestly answer the question “What have I learned from this?” How is this redemptive for me? How is this redemptive for us? What have we learned? Do I believe that there can truly be redemption in the face of suffering, or do I just want to react to pain and cause more suffering for me and for others? Where do we draw these lines and how do we learn from our suffering so that it can be redemptive? How will all that I have learned truly change me at depth, change how I think, how I show up on this earth, in all my relationships?
Those are tough questions for us as we the path of the “resurrected consciousness” of the Easter experience. One of the primary considerations is to recall that there is no redemption/resurrection in scapegoating, so that is a pattern that we have to let go. The victim/perpetrator/rescuer triangle is the essence of codependent dysfunction and also a dead end; a familiar one, but nonetheless, a dead end. Jesus was with us in the human experience of suffering, he was not rescued from it. That is how the suffering of Jesus was redemptive; he never identified with or played the victim card.
It is important to see the redemptive pattern in our relationship with the earth. As the earth has been impacted by human behavior, Mother Earth has demonstrated a natural reaction in producing more severe weather; she has pushed back to get our attention, so to speak. It has caused us more suffering. We can see that in the increased severity of storms and what we are now calling “weather events.” We are clearly in relationship with Mother Earth, and there is NO RESCUER here. This is not the Perpetrator/Victim/Rescuer triangle. The most viable option is to lean into these experiences with a willingness to collectively learn what we need to learn. That means that we allow the “crucifixion/redemption/transformation process to unfold.
In his Earth Day Meditation, Richard Rohr, on April 22, 2019 says this:
Resurrection and renewal are, in fact, the universal and observable patterns of everything. We might just as well use non-religious terms like springtime, regeneration, healing, forgiveness, life cycles, darkness and light. If incarnation is real, then resurrection in multitudinous forms is to be fully expected. Or to paraphrase a statement attributed to Albert Einstein, it is not that one thing is a miracle, but that the whole thing is a miracle!.... The Risen Christ is not a one-time miracle but the revelation of a universal pattern that is hard to see in the short run.
Our job is to figure out not the how or the when of resurrection, but just the what! Leave the how and the when to science and to God. True Christianity and true science are both transformational worldviews that place growth and development at their centers. Both endeavors, each in its own way, cooperate with some Divine Plan; whether God is formally acknowledged may not be that important. As C. G. Jung inscribed over his doorway, Vocatus atque non vocatus, Deus aderit, “Invoked or not invoked, God is still present.”
Well, that leaves us struggling to not devolve into blaming others, but to hold the tensions of the opposites, the crucifixion/resurrection energy that will ultimately bring change in how we relate to Mother Earth, our Island Home. What are the breakthroughs that are needed for us to move into a healthier, transformed relationship with one another and with the Earth? It is very clear that the deep change we need does not happen by blaming one another, staying trapped in the victim/perpetrator/rescuer triangle. We take hope from the Apostle Paul’s message to the Romans:
Romans 8:25-28 (NRSV)
25 But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience. 26 Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. 27 And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God. 28 We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose.
In faith, we walk together trusting that when we seek to act from our Christ Consciousness, the path is made clear. For the crucifixion/suffering of the earth to become redemptive, we need to see how much we love the earth and how critical it is that we put that love into action. We have had the woundedness and now we need to embrace the healing, the resurrection.
As Richard Rohr continued on April 23, 2019:
I’ve often said that great love and great suffering (both healing and woundedness) are the universal, always available paths of transformation because they are the only things strong enough to take away the ego’s protections and pretensions. Great love and great suffering bring us back to God, and I believe this is how Jesus himself walked humanity back to God. It is not just a path of resurrection rewards but a path that now includes death and woundedness. Or as I teach our Living School students, the sequence goes order —> disorder —> reorder!
We are engaged in the mystery of universal suffering which when we allow it can change us so that we can be freed from this endless cycle of projecting our pain elsewhere or remaining trapped inside of it. When we begin to live a fully resurrected life, then we can trust in the promise of Love as Paul spoke of in Romans. When we can hold the contradictions and resolve them within ourselves, then we become the real agents of transformation, reconciliation and rebirth. We will truly be ready to heal the Earth. We have to wake up again to the Beauty, the wonder and the fragility of our Island Home; it is the only one we have. And lest we forget, 192 countries around the earth celebrate Earth Day.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MHIfRLNYUGw
Blessings on the Path,
Rev. Deb