The Earth Breathing - An Earth Day Prayer

Breathing Under Water

My route home from the office goes along Departure Bay beach in Nanaimo.

Yesterday, for the first time, I saw a deer at the low tide's water edge.

Seeing a deer is very common, they sleep under our deck with the fawns. But seeing a deer at the sea edge, as if it had become a Heron, was new for me.

I couldn't tell what it was doing (grazing, drinking!) or thinking (go for a swim, how do I open a clam), but it reminded me of an amazing new book by Richard Rohr called "Breathing Under Water". I highly recommend it.

The title comes from this poem

I built my house by the sea.

Not on the sands, mind you;

not on the shifting sand.

And I built it of rock.

A strong house

by a strong sea.

And we got well acquainted, the sea and I.

Good neighbors.

Not that we spoke much.

We met in silences.

Respectful, keeping our distance,

but looking our thoughts across the fence of sand.

Always, the fence of sand our barrier,

always, the sand between.

And then one day,

--and I still don’t know how it happened--

the sea came.

Without warning.

Without welcome, even.

Not sudden and swift, but a shifting across the sand

like wine,

less like the flow of water then the flow of blood.

Slow, but coming.

Slow, but flowing like an open wound.

And I thought of flight and I thought of drowning

and I thought of death.

And while I thought to the sea crept higher, till it

reached my door.

And I knew then, there was neither flight, not death,

nor drowning.

That when the sea comes calling you stop being

good neighbors

well acquainted, friendly-at-a-distance, neighbors

And you give your house for a coral castle,

And you learn to breathe underwater.

Carol Bieleck R.S.C.J.

Moral Proximity

I recently contracted a nasty sinus infection that left me tired all the time.   An essential part of my recovery was afternoon nap and reading time.  So I hauled the works of Alexander McCall Smith from the library and he became my companion for two full weeks.

I’m struck once more by the theme of moral proximity—how his characters feel compelled to tend for another because of their contact with each other, whether that contact was intentional or not.  They don’t necessarily choose to be involved; sometimes they are distinctly reluctant.  But when they realize that there is something they could do for another, they are compelled to do it by a sense of moral duty. 

The other thing that is striking about his work is the kind of caring exhibited by the main characters in his two major series.  Mma Ramotswe and Isabelle Dalhousie rarely act out of the energy of control or busy-body-ness, but rather tenderness and compassion.

There are two good reminders for me here.  The first is that I am my brother’s keeper, and my sister’s keeper; and my sister and brother are whoever shows up on my radar.  The second is that when I find myself charged up by something, that’s not the energy that actually helps.  I need to find that more tender and quiet generosity that recognizes limits, brokenness, and love.

Therese desCamp

A story from Iona:

A story from Iona:

On Iona in the early days of the Iona Community, it was decided to commission a well-known glassmaker to make six glass communion cups for use in the Abbey. The craftsman was asked to engrave a suitable biblical text on each of the cups. 'This the blood of the new covenant', 'This do in remembrance of me', and so on. Now this craftsman, as it happened, was not a churchman, although he was sympathetic to 'Christianity'. And when he received the commission he made one request: Could he choose one of the texts to engrave on the cups? His request was granted.

And when the cups were delivered, the folk on Iona were intrigued to discover that the text he had chosen was from the arrest of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, when Judas betrays Jesus with a kiss. And the text that he had engraved on the cup was Jesus's question to Judas: 'Friend, wherefore art thou come?'

Let us hold that question as we willingly walk into Holy Week.

Blessings to all,

Lori Megley-Best

A Holy Week poem

This poem is a delightful expression of humility and being human, and being 'surrendered' to God's love.

i am a little church (no great cathedral)
far from the splendor and squalor of hurrying cities
-i do not worry if briefer days grow briefest,
i am not sorry when sun and rain make april

my life is the life of the reaper and the sower;
my prayers are prayers of earth's own clumsily striving
(finding and losing and laughing and crying) children
whose any sadness or joy is my grief or my gladness

around me surges a miracle of unceasing
birth and glory and death and resurrection:
over my sleeping self float flaming symbols
of hope, and i wake to a perfect patience of mountains

i am a little church (far from the frantic
world with its rapture and anguish) at peace with nature
-i do not worry if longer nights grow longest;
i am not sorry when silence becomes singing

winter by spring, i lift my diminutive spire to
merciful Him Whose only now is forever:
standing erect in the deathless truth of His presence
(welcoming humbly His light and proudly His darkness)

~ e.e.cummings