Earth Day is tomorrow. It’s having it’s 45th birthday.
On the one hand, people are aware and involved.
On the other, we are naive, oblivious and self involved.
It’s all very hard work. Many of us do some of the things we’re supposed to. We work to reduce, recycle, reuse. We compost. We drive better cars. And all of us have secret and not so secret places where we’re not really so good.
One of the places we often fall down is in the political involvement, because corporations do all sorts of dirty things that all the bricks in the toilet and turning off the water while brushing your teeth can’t begin to touch.
I think we also pay too little attention to the sacredness of this planet. I think that because we litter, we don’t pay enough attention, we accept that things are/will be polluted. Why is it a crime to desecrate a church and not the land? it has come to this, picking up trash, working to clean up streams, protesting pollution and unsafe practices is a life of prayer. Are we ready for that?
I know the original chant said it a little differently, but my group always sang it this way:
- Where I stand is holy
- Holy is the ground
- Forest, mountain, river,
- Listen to the sound
- Love is all around me.
In this time of the Flower Moon, when Mother Earth so generously shares her beauty and promises her bounty, let us take off our shoes and stand in grateful reverence. And then let us begin the work of Peace with the Earth.
