I who am the beauty of the green earth and the white moon among the stars and the mysteries of the waters,I call upon your soul to arise and come unto Me.
For I am the soul of nature that gives life to the universe.
From Me all things proceed and unto Me they must return.
Let My worship be in the heart that rejoices, for behold--- all acts of love and pleasure are My rituals.
Let there be beauty and strength, power and compassion, honor and humility, mirth and reverence within you.
And you who seek to know Me, know that your seeking and yearning will avail you not, unless you know the Mystery.
For if that which you seek, you find not within yourself, you will never find it without.
For behold, I have been with you from the beginning.
And I am that which is attained at the end of desire.
Schools, churches, and the media are all beginning to sound the same message: that it is our duty to live lightly on the land, to refashion our lives in at least modest ways to make amends for the environmental woes we are causing. It can be quite depressing. We begin to think of our own species as uniquely malign. Only through self-abnegation and saintly acts can we halt the destruction. The best we can hope for is to do less harm. And we do less harm by way of duty.
Duty is that which we do because we should---not because we would. In contrast, an action that is as natural as drawing breath is not a duty. In Immanuel Kant's terminology, a difficult-appearing act undertaken without any thought of duty, perhaps even joyfully, is a beautiful act. A beautiful act, unlike a dutiful one, arises from our deepest inclinations. We simply could not do otherwise.
Arne Naess, the Norwegian philosopher who gave the "deep ecology" worldview its earliest expression, believes Kant's distinction is crucial for the earth's well-being. "When people feel they unselfishly give up or sacrifice their self-interests to show love for nature," warns Naess, "this is a treacherous basis for conservation." Doing right by the earth should, rather, feel as natural as doing right by our families, our very selves. According to Naess, the way to nurture this mind-set is to expand our notion of self to include Self---the greater self of the planet, with all its creatures and landscapes.
The ecological crises thus demands a deep solution. The will to change must come from within. Only a shift in values can work a lasting shift in laws and institutions and, most important, everyday practices. And those values must emerge from a shift in worldview that is in a fundamental sense religious.
This has been another terribly difficult sermon to write. In many ways, the subject carries us into another dimension of oppression, where for good reasons and bad, through conscious and unconscious intention, human beings are perpetrating acts of violence on this beloved planet, from which we may never recover, by which our species, along with most of the others on the planet may very well become extinct.
As with any issue of human violence and oppression, there are many views about why it is happening, and many more about how it ought to be dealt with. I'm not interested, today, in examining those questions---our work beyond Sunday morning in the Anti-Oppression Alliance, the Deep Ecology and Voluntary Simplicity groups can address those issues in working sessions where real proactive commitments to take effective action can be made. Within the structure of this sacred time, what I want is for us to psychically travel into the deeps of the issue with our hearts open, this issue of the very life of our planet, this issue that calls us to examine, perhaps more than we ever have been called before, and at depths we have never gone before, how we are living our lives.
So, imaging a wonderful tropical fruit that inside its vibrantly colored skin, is divided into four lobes, my talk will have four parts: The Roots. The Problem. The Grief. The Remembering & the Hope.
"We are stardust, we are golden. And we've got to get ourselves back to the garden." Joni Mitchell's 70's song is, in its way, a descriptive container for the fundamental story of our times. The lush detail that emerges out of that story, about the geophysical and biological generativity of the universe as well as this wondrous planet, makes it the most inventive, complex and creative creation story humankind has ever told itself. To quote UU Connie Barlow, a science editor and writer specializing in evolutionary biology, the author of this morning's quote, "We are indeed reworked stardust. Scientists first got an inkling of this shimmering fact in the 1950s. We now know that every element on earth and in our bodies that is heavier than hydrogen and helium was created in the bowels of a supernova that blew up in this sector of the galaxy some five billions years ago." That event issued from what she calls, far more poetically, and accurately than the Big Bang, The Great Radiance.
Joni sang it, "We" she sang. We, all, spread out across the planet. We, richly diverse in cultures, in languages, in what we eat and sing, how we mate and mourn. We, flowing into valleys to farm, fanning out upon the great plains and alluvial flats, to build villages and cities and sophisticated metropolises. We, loving and laughing, arguing and fighting, sharing and stealing.
We . . . are. We . . . came . . . from up there, out there . . . to become this. We ARE, she sang. In this moment . . . now, we are. And we are connected through time, and through substance, to THAT, to the stars. Come from stars is our Earth, and therefore, we . . .all . . . are here. Here on this globe . . . this globe of what? Of molten rock with a hard crust? Of inanimate, dead, massive and inert materials? We know better now. This planet has on its surface a wild effulgence of life forms that have persisted for 3,500 million years; this planet is wrapped in the mantel of an atmosphere that sustains elements like methane and nitrous oxide that feed that life, are produced by that life. A lifeless ball? We know better, now. We now know that the chemical composition of the atmosphere, defies the rules of steady state composition. The violation of the rules of chemistry in Earth's atmosphere represents a disequilibrium of such a scale that it suggests, to quote Andrew Dobson in a book called the Green Reader, "that the atmosphere is not merely a biological product, but more probably a biological construction: not living, but like a cat's fur, a bird's feathers, or the paper of a wasp's nest, an extension of a living system designed to maintain a chosen environment."
Then he adds another statement of astounding implications: "The climate and the chemical properties of the earth now and throughout history seem always to have been optimal for life. For this to have happened by chance is as unlikely as to survive unscathed a drive blindfold through rush-hour traffic."
At some fundamental level, the conclusion I draw from this is that I live . . . because the Earth lives. I breath . . . because the Earth breaths. I have had progeny in my life . . . because I am the progeny of the Earth. The roots of our existence lie in the vital existence of the Earth itself. The Earth is life friendly, life generative. And that life follows evolutionary patterns that are convergent or parallel; that is, similar, almost identical, life forms frequently develop in separate places on the planet without any interaction: substructures in the expression of life, as, from, by the Earth, create particular beings through the inherent principles of the living Earth itself.
The complexity in this room, here among us, men and women, tall and short, fair and dark, reflects the creativity of the active Earth. The commonality in this room, all with legs and arms, all with spines and hearts, all with hair and muscle, reflects the persistence of forms that work, work to sustain life, work to encourage the flourishing of life, work to express something . . . . What?
The Sacred "What?" What ARE we here for? If we can take guidance from the Earth itself, a partial answer is . . . To protect creation. To protect it is to bless it. To bless it is to give it further, renewed, enlivened, more creative life. John Seed, founder and director of the Rainforest Information Centers, once wrote, " 'I am protecting the rainforest' develops into 'I am part of the rainforest protecting myself. I am that part of the rainforest recently emerged into thinking.' " And I would add, "Recently emerged into a consciousness that I am." I am rainforest become human. I am Earth become, rainforest, become human. I am stardust become Earth become rainforest become human become conscious.
All of that richness and outrageous creativity is facing the worst peril to its existence the planet has ever known, now, here, in our times. But it is a complex peril, brought on from out of the very guts of creativity itself. Theodore Roszak, historian and environmentalist writer in California, tells the tale of a young Polish woman named Anna, a member of the Solidarity movement traveling the US in the 1980s; she came here partly as a political emissary and partly on a pilgrimage seeking inspiration from our democracy and our wealth. On a grocery shopping trip with her guests she entered a Safeway store. "She had heard of supermarkets, but had never seen one. When the automatic door opened and ushered her in, she stood a long while staring in all directions. Then she wept. She walked the aisles of the store and the tears kept coming." Roszak goes on to make the difficult, complex and enigmatic point that her desire to participate in such abundance is not the product of greed, but of victimization. Her experience of hardship, under communist Poland, had resulted because of privation that was due to injustice, incompetence, and corruption; her hardship of poverty was compounded by the indignity of victimization. Her hunger for material abundance was a hunger for self-respect and independence. We recognize what that abundance is now doing to the planet, but how can we, the planet's foremost consumers, judge or restrain such a one as Anna when we are so profligate and undisciplined ourselves?
The litany of the devastation of this planet, which is in so many ways perpetrated by our country, is known by us all on at least the most evident levels. Timber lands scraped bare contributing to the warming of the entire planet. Our waterways poisoned by viscously toxic chemical wastes. The life of the oceans dwindling from overfishing and pollution. Our cities choking on smog and deadly emissions. The velvet beauty of the night skies, swept clean of stars by an orgy of artificial light. Species extinguished into nothingness with maniacal speed. We are in, in all probability, the sixth great era of extinction. The aftermath of each of the previous five eras required five to ten million years for the animal and plant life to recover from the deep trough of impoverishment, in both number and specie.
The horror of the extinctions that we are experiencing, however, is compounded---and their recovery not at all assured---because the causes of the devastation may very well continue, making recovery impossible.
At the heart of the problem, beyond the frightening specifics, are some core philosophical commitments that must be addressed for any real change and reversal to have any chance of succeeding. This is always the issue with societal, systemic and institutional change: It is the core values, the fundamental worldview, both conscious and unconscious (and the more powerful values are the unstated, unconscious ones), which must be changed, or the system will continue its destructive patterns, even though cosmetic changes are constantly being made. (In the case of racism, for example, we see more people of color on TV, analyzing sports events; to get and keep the job, however, those individuals have to fit the mold of the dominant and controlling values) Let me list some of the central disastrous values that involve the earth, our environment, and ecology by summarizing the words of Tanya Kucak, writing in Yoga Journal, in 1986.
The first of these is that Man is the center of all things. (This belief accurately excludes women.) The non human world, in this schema, is valued only in terms of its usefulness to men. The dividing lines between Man and nature are absolute, and clear.
Another point that lies at the core of ecological pillage is the conviction that the world, the universe, is atomistic, divisible, non-relativistic, and only to be understood by reductionistic methods. The world is best understood as mechanism. Nature is inert; plants are static; rocks are dead.
A third is that economic growth is the be-all-and-end-all of life for humans on this planet. Nature is an economic resource that must be managed, and is to be exploited. Economic growth and development are the penultimate considerations for our human existence.
Here, you see, is the real problem. We cannot be in right relationship with the earth, out of which we have come, and of which we are an expression---nor can we have authentic relationships of respect and caring for one another, for other human beings---as long as we hold values that define us as separate and superior and which declare that the purpose of life is to consume and feed the economy.
In their wonderful book, Thinking Like A Mountain, deep ecologists John Seed, Joanna Macy, Pat Fleming and Arne Naess, lead us to another level of the problem. They lead us to encounter the deeper meaning of the losses we are so violently perpetrating against ourselves, and the earth. They lead us to the deeper grief, that we all bear deep in our hearts about the devastation and the loss that surrounds us, that seems to wash over us like a poisonous tide against which we can do nothing.
This time, and this space, in all its sacred connection and simple ritual, is just the place where we can open ourselves to that reality.
Let us all take hands together. You may want to close your eyes as I recite for you Joanna Macy's Beastiary: A litany of the extinction of life forms on our planet. I will begin the litany with the sounding of the bell. I will end it with the sounding of the bell.
[ Bell ]
short-tailed albatross
whooping crane
gray wolf
peregrine falcon
hawksbill turtle
jaguar
rhinoceros
In Geneva, the international tally of endangered species
[1], kept up to date in
looseleaf volumes is becoming too heavy to lift. Where do we now record the
passing of life? What funerals or farewells are appropriate?
reed warbler
swallow-tail butterfly
Manx shearwater
Indian python
howler monkey
sperm whale
blue whale
Dive me deep, brother whale, in this time we have left. Deep in our mother
ocean where once I swam, gilled and finned. The salt from those early seas
still runs in my tears. Tears are too meager now. Give me a song . . . a
song for a sadness too vast for my heart, for a rage too wild for my throat.
anteater
antelope
grizzly bear
brown bear
Bactrian camel
Nile crocodile
American alligator
Ooze me, alligator, in the mud whence I came. Belly me slow in the rich
primordial soup, cradle of our molecules. Let me wallow again, before we
pave it over and blast it to ash.
gray bat
ocelot
marsh mouse
blue pike
red kangaroo
Aleutian goose
Audouin's seagull
Quick, lift off. Sweep me high over the coast and out, farther out. Don't
land here. Oil spills coat the beach, rocks, sea. I cannot spread my wings
glued with tar. Fly me from what we have done, fly me far.
golden parakeet
African ostrich
Florida panther
Galapagos penguin
Imperial pheasant
leopard
Utah prairie dog
Hide me in a hedgerow, badger. Can't you find one? Dig me a tunnel through
leaf mold and roots, under the trees that once defined our fields. My heart
is bulldozed and plowed over. Burrow me a labyrinth deeper than longing.
thick-billed parrot
zone-tailed pigeon
desert bandicoot
Southern bald eagle
California condor
lotus blue butterfly
Crawl me out of here, caterpillar. Spin me a cocoon. Wind me to sleep in a
shroud of silk, where in patience my bones will dissolve. I'll wait as long
as all creation if only it will come again---and I take wing.
Atlantic Ridley turtle
pearly mussel
helmeted hornbill
sea otter
humpback whale
monk seal
harp seal
Swim me out beyond the ice floes, mama. Where are you? Boots squeeze my
ribs, clubs drum my fur, the white world goes black with the taste of my
blood.
gorilla
gibbon
sand gazelle
swamp deer
musk deer
cheetah
chinchilla
Asian elephant
African elephant
Sway me slowly through the jungle. There still must be jungle somewhere, my
heart drips with green secrets. Hose me down by the waterhole, there is
buckshot in my hide. Tell me old stories while you can remember.
fan-tailed flycatcher
flapshell tortoise
crested ibis
hook-billed kite
bobcat
frigate bird
In the time when his world, like ours, was ending, Noah had a list of the
animals, too. We picture him standing by the gangplank, calling their names,
checking them off on his scroll. Now we also are checking them off.
ivory-billed woodpecker
brown pelican
Florida manatee
Canada goose
We reenact Noah's ancient drama, but in reverse, like a film running
backwards, the animals exiting.
ferret
curlew
cougar
wolf
Your tracks are growing fainter. Wait. Wait. This is a hard time. Don't
leave us alone in a world we have wrecked.
[ Bell ]
What is the hope that can sustain us? What is the spirituality upon which we can stake our claim not just to go on, but to flourish? Remembering that spirituality, in the words of African American activist and scholar, Cornell West, is whatever engenders hope. The hope for our survival, for the survival of the fauna and flora of this wondrous blue planet, laced with green, begins with the great gift of consciousness: We can be aware of the motivations that have unconsciously and consciously driven us, and of the consequences of our actions.
Our hope for hope continues with the power of choice-making: we can choose to change, and to make changes in how we live; we can choose to challenge the structures and the powers which perpetrate the worst of it all; we can choose to regain our love of the Earth, and thereby forge a relationship of lasting intimacy and depth.
And hope is deepened, as well, by the fact that change is truly possible: We are an enormously adaptable and creative life form; our love for the Earth, our recognition that we are the Earth, consciously alive, offers profound hope for real and lasting change.
Finally, hope is born out by the reality of Compassion: As I have said before, compassion is one of the sacred keys to freedom. We are not free, however, unless we are in tender connection with the Earth. We are not free unless we are not only tolerant, but fully celebrative at the heart level. The greatest good we can do one another, and the Earth is to love. It is that form of love called compassion which has the power to dispense with disagreement in bold strokes, and forge the only kind of agreements which last, agreements that recognize the inherent worth of the other and that acknowledge our fundamental interdependence.
We can dare to have hope, because we are enormously gifted. We are gifted with Consciousness, Choice, Change and Compassion. Our gifts are deep enough to have brought us into an emergence of spirit and intelligence that is good and vast and deep---for the Earth is good and vast and deep, and we are her gifted progeny.
May we, then, go forward in the days ahead celebrating our gifts, ever declaring our allegiance to this beleaguered, yet so responsive Earth, ever deepening our love.
Amen. Shalom. Blessed Be. Namasté.
Let us understand The gravity of our situation.Let us understand That our only redemption Is love.
Love for a small, endangered planet on which we are utterly dependent.
Only love can transform us From plunderers and savagers Into Earthkeepers and peacemakers.
Only love can show us The integrity and rights Of all other beings.
Only love can open our eyes To the truth That surround us.
Only love can teach us The humility we need To live on this Earth.
And only love can now save us From extinction.