by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Feb 9, 2015
‘Tis the season of red: red hearts, red candy, red cards, red bows, red boxes of chocolates…all for Valentine’s Day. I love red as much as the next person, but when it comes to how followers of Jesus show love, I believe green is the new red.
In the church we know green as the color of growing in Christ, of maturing in faith. It’s the color of Ordinary Season–the weeks between Advent and Lent, and between Easter and Advent.
Green has another meaning as well. It’s also the color of sustainability, eco-friendly practices, and environmental awareness. Both the ecclesiastical and the ecological meanings are deeply intertwined.
They’re so deeply intertwined that I don’t think we can grow in Christ and mature in our faith without taking an active interest in the health and vibrancy of the Creation too. Why do I say this? The Creation is the general revelation of God, revealing God’s own nature. (Romans 1:20) We have been given dominion over it and asked to be caretakers of it. (Genesis 1-2). So wiping it out is like erasing God’s own imprint on the planet. Not a good idea. Christ himself is the firstborn of all Creation, through whom all Creation has been made. (Colossians 1:15). We have a responsibility toward it, as much as toward one another. That’s why I say green is the new red.
I want to share with you five things to start doing to green your love of God and one important thing to stop doing immediately.
Start Doing: Incorporate awareness of the Creation in Worship
When we gather to worship God we are joining our voices with the majestic choir of creation. Just as we humans gather to praise God through song, liturgy, sermon and communion, so the creation offers its praise to God, too. The psalmists write that the earth rejoices, the coastlands are glad, the trees clap their hands, and the heavens and earth praise God.
Sing: So many of the traditional songs of the church lift up creation. Sing them!
Pray: Ask for God’s wisdom in how to fulfill our role as stewards of the Creation. Focus on different aspects of the earth weekly such as different animals, rivers, forests, oceans, beaches, soil, and sky. Use your prayers to affirm positive advances being made.
Children’s sermon: Teach children about our interconnectedness with nature. Jesus told stories incorporating sky, sheep, goats, birds, flowers, mountains, and fields. So can we!
Sermon: Develop a yearly series on our deep relationship to the Creation. Incorporate the new four-week Season of Creation into your liturgical calendar. It highlights the work of God the Creator and the wonders of creation.
Observe Earth Sabbath or Environmental Sabbath, a worldwide ecumenical day of reverence for the earth around June 5, World Environment Day. Gather with other congregations in your area to hold an interfaith service. Consider patterning your service after the United Nation’s Environmental Sabbath Programme.
Holy Communion: Recognize Christ as the firstborn of all creation, our oneness with him, and by extension, our unity with creation.
Stop Doing: Thinking It’s Too Hard
All of us live on one planet. We all share the same water, air, earth, and sky. God would not give us something to do that we are not capable of. Read the Green Bible (NRSV) to get grounded in the Word in a new way. Start a Green Team. Read Green Church with your friends. Or simply begin with a prayer for courage. Just don’t say it’s too hard! Love always wins. Especially if it’s green.
Adapted in part from 7 Simple Steps to Green Your Church, by Rebekah Simon-Peter, (c) copyright 2010.
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Sep 29, 2010
Jonathan Ormes, retired NASA scientist, and I made plans to meet while I was on my way to lead a women’s retreat on the topic of sabbath and the environment. I wanted to talk with him about my theory that practicing sabbath is an environmentally friendly discipline.
“Absolutely,” he said. “In fact, we can tell from space where and when people are observing the sabbath all around the world.” “Really?” I asked, “from space?” This was better than I thought.
He said, “We can see that levels of nitrous oxides—byproducts of fossil-fuel combustion, among other things—fluctuate during the week. They go down on Friday in Islamic countries; down on Saturday in Israel; and down on Sunday in the United States, Europe, and Japan. Those levels don’t go down at all in China; the numbers stay pretty steady throughout the week. This lowering of nitrous oxide levels is called the sabbath effect or the weekend effect.” In other words, the less people drive and the less industry produces, the cleaner the air.
Listening to Dr. Ormes, I marveled at the convergence of science and spirituality. The Scriptures call us to be stewards of the creation; science lets us know how we are doing at it. According to Dr. Ormes, not too well. For the elevated presence of nitrous oxides during the week is connected to ozone smog and acid rain, which are dramatically changing the atmospheric composition.
Perhaps it is no coincidence that the intended outcome of sabbath observance––being refreshed (Exodus 23:12; 31:17)––can also be translated as “paused-for-breath.” Childhood asthma is on the increase, as are other respiratory difficulties. All are linked to the quality of our air. Sabbath rest literally clears the air and gives us breathing room. In fact, sabbath reveals itself as the first environmentally friendly biblical covenant. Sabbath is good for people and the earth. It is not a stretch to say that faith grounded in the Bible is “green.” Sustainability is built into the very fabric of creation.
Which day should you observe sabbath? Some Christians are adopting the practice of the early church by honoring the creation on the seventh day of the week, Saturday, and the Lord’s resurrection on the first day of the week, Sunday. Others reclaim the dual emphases of creation and Christ together on Sunday. Another option is to carve out mini-sabbaths at another time during the week. It may not matter as much which day you set apart as how you start to synchronize your life with the rhythms of creation so that healing may begin.
Sabbath is important for reducing our stress and our impact on the planet, but do not make it impossible to experience sabbath. If you cannot start with a day of rest, how about an hour? Then month by month expand that hour until you have reached a full day of rest. I invite you to try it. You just might like it. I will be right alongside you.
This blogpost is excerpted from Green Church: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Rejoice! by Rebekah Simon-Peter and published by Abingdon Press, 2010. Buy your copy here:http://www.amazon.com/Green-Church-Reduce-Recycle-Rejoice/dp/1426702922/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1285765665&sr=1-1-spell
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Sep 8, 2010
What does it mean to be made in the image of God?
I have been thinking about this a lot lately.According to Genesis 1 where that concept is found, God speaks and the world comes into being. Then God blesses, and multiplies. And the world grows in richness, depth and complexity.
I used to think this notion of creation was weird. God speaks and things come into being? C’mon. Archaic at best. Simplistic and childish at worst.
But I’m outnumbered, by biblical writers anyway. The writer of The Gospel of John declares that Jesus is Logos or Word. You know…In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God and the Word was God. Pretty heady stuff.
Turns out this idea of creating through the spoken word has a correlate with quantum physics. That is, there is no such thing as objective reality which can simply be observed. Every observer is actually a participant! Since the days of Einstein, we’ve figured out that we live in a participatory universe that responds to our being. What I’m saying is, Word has power. Not just Jesus’ word, but ours too.
Maybe then to be made in the image of God, is to speak/create a world that is rich, blessed, and interdependent. A world that works for all of us of: all people, all creatures, and the planet itself.
So I’ve taken this idea of being made in the image of God seriously. And I’ve been experimenting with speaking a new world into being. One that blesses and enriches everyone and everything.
My current experiment? The Peace Forest. I declared it–without knowing where or how it would be planted. Before we had a place to plant, trees to put in the ground or money to do it, I declared it. Just to see.
Then I invited fellow Jews, Christians and Muslims to help design it. My delightful companions got on board. Now we are all declaring the existence of this Peace Forest. In addition to finding trees, inviting volunteers, seeking donations, and the like.
The cool thing is that it’s working. And something that never existed before now exists. Even before the day we plant. Out of it new community is growing. One that values both religious faith and the environment.
Yup, the spoken word is powerful.
Of course, it
So now I’m asking you to take action to make this a reality: Here’s what I’d like you to do:
1. Speak about the Peace Forest to others. Tell your friends. Announce it in your religious services.
2. Pray about it and give thanks for it.
3. If you can, sponsor a shrub or tree or grove.
3. If at all possible, come help us turn the soil and plant a tree or two. This year, we’re starting with 100 trees. We’d like at least 100 people to help us plant.
You know what’s cool? Not only are we restoring Mother Earth, we are restoring faithful relations with one another.
It is, after all, a participatory universe. The way things are responds to the way we are.
Can I get an Amen?
by Rebekah Simon-Peter | Aug 27, 2010
There I sat at a conference table with Betsy, Saba, Fatuma, Monir, and Jeanette. We were not your typical tree-hugger types. Three of us are Muslim, one is a cradle, Christian, one is a former Evangelical Christian with New Thought leanings, and me, well I’m a United Methodist clergywoman who was born and raised Jewish. (More on that in another blog!) Two of us wore head coverings, and half of us had reached the half-century mark. Yet, there we were, working out our manifesto for the Peace Forest.
The Peace Forest, an initiative of BridgeWorks, is what I think of as a Mother Earth Mission project. Let me explain.
Often, United Methodists, and other mainline Christians, think of mission work as assisting those in need–whether the needs be material, financial, emotional or even spiritual. We excel at mission work in the wake of natural disasters. For instance, we were on the scene in a jiffy after Hurricane Katrina, the Haiti earthquake, and myriad other storms.
But it’s becoming clearer that it’s not just people who need to be rescued and restored from natural disasters. It’s the earth itself.
As I wrote about in a recent issue of Circuit Rider, ecological imbalances lie at the heart of many natural and unnatural disasters.
Our Peace Forest will address one of them–deforestation–while building bonds of community between different religious people.
This project brings together people from the three Abrahamic Faiths (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) to plant a living symbol of earth care. One that can make a profound difference for the planet.
But, as Jeanette pointed out, it’s hard enough to unite people around caring for the earth. Let alone embarking on real interfaith work. Perhaps some will be attracted to the environmental aspect of our work and not care a hoot about religion. While others will be deeply committed to interfaith work and not be moved by environmental concerns at all.
Can we work together? Can we find others who will want to work with us?
I feel confident that we will. I’m very jazzed about this idea!
A few years ago, I read A Common Word Between Us. Written by Muslims Christians and Jews it highlights the sacred “words” we share in common such as love of God and love of neighbor.
Reading it, I realized we not only have a common word between us, we share a common world! If we, who can agree on the love of God and love of neighbor, can also discover the common words of creation care in our sacred texts, then we can bring about a positive revolution for each person on the planet.
That’s what the Peace Forest is about: nothing more, nothing less! And it all starts with trees.
