Writing this article was a time of intellectual and spiritual stargazing over a two-month period. I began brooding during the August heat wave. I was trying to get some down days to rest and do some work around my home and yard. It was simply too hot to do anything outside after 10am. I felt helpless and tired. In the midst of that, it seemed that our island was on fire, and so many people were vulnerable, too.
I finished the article at the very end of the month. Things certainly changed in a hurry. Temperatures had dropped and the electric heat had been turned on to get the early morning chill out of my kitchen. It seems we have no choice these days but to live between extremes.
Back in early August, and a 39-degree morning, a friend who is a priest sent me a note in the form of a meditation, suggesting that when life gets full and demanding, it is a good idea to go outside and walk on the ground in your bare feet and listen to the Earth and let it bless you.
I am a “barefoot” advocate, and often walk on the dirt and grass in my yard to do just that: listen to the Earth in my heart. My friend’s note reminded me that it had been a while, because of the demands and busyness of my life of late. My feet touched the ground, and they began to burn. The sun was blazing. The heat was overwhelming. I heard the Earth in my heart, reminding me that it too felt vulnerable and tired. The Earth is trying to help us live; the Earth brought us into being.
Standing in the heat, I thought of a portion of Matthew 23:37: “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the city that kills the prophets and stones God’s messengers! How often I have wanted to gather your children together as a hen protects her chicks beneath her wings, but you wouldn’t let me.”
The Earth is indeed on fire; climate change is just one aspect of that. Here is a short list of what I mean:
Fire of Climate Change: Where we continue to ignore all we have been taught about the fragility of our tiny planet.
Fire of Culture: Which insists that values must be discarded or changed to conform to how those in charge can access every inch of our lives.
Fire of Debt: Where people are told they deserve more, better, bigger, and longer. None of this is free, but it is readily available for a price. You don’t want to be left behind, or see people rubbing their new cars, cabins, and trips in your face… on Facebook.
Fire of Nationalism: After all we have learned through studies of world history, nations still defend their culture, religions, and desire for domination, justifying brutality and extreme violence because of a sense of superiority and power. Nations causing genocide, as the rest of the world looks on in silence as people have everything taken from them, are dehumanized, and then left to starve to death. #FastforGaza
Fire of Religion: Where ecclesial cultures protect structures of power, where people think they have a revelation of the divine denied to others, where buildings and tradition have become God, and love and respect are afterthoughts.
Toward the end of August, I once again stepped off my patio in my bare feet. The ground was wet with morning dew. I was wearing a sweater against the morning chill. I walked around my yard listening to the Earth. My feet became very cold.
To me, the Earth was saying, “I am feeling vulnerable and tired, but don’t be deceived. I am not at all helpless. The laws of nature can provide for life and balance for all. If humanity does not care to participate in that, and continues in your coldhearted ways of being, your time will end.”
To me, that was an invitation to become more intentional about the person I am. The Earth reminded me that it is time for all of us to look at all of the fires we have burning out of control, then decide what to do with them. The one fire that truly needs to be kindled, perhaps for the first time, is for us to realize how similar and interdependent we are, and how wonderful we could be together as people of generosity, who have realized what national borders, spiritual and cultural prisons, and selfish ambition have done to destroy our potential of fulfilling God’s dream for us all.
