“Blowin’ in the Wind:” Cole Arthur Riley and a Prayer for Place

("Blowin’ in the Wind" is a periodic feature on my blog containing an assortment of nature writings – songs, excerpts, poems, prayers, Bible readings or other things – pieces written by others but that inspire me or give me joy. I trust they’ll do the same for you.)

One of my more recent discoveries is a work by young African-American writer Cole Arthur Riley. I first became acquainted with her initial 2022 book, This Here Flesh: Spirituality, Liberation, and the Stories that Make Us, in some of my racial righteousness work. I found her writing astonishingly and even painfully lovely as she shared poignant essay after essay on her experience as a woman of color, particularly her situation, of course, as a black woman of color. She wrote there on such subjects as dignity, wonder, rage, belonging, fear, lament, place, justice and liberation, among others.

Her early reputation and following, however, was first established in a series of online writings called “Black Liturgies,” which she began in 2020. It is then no surprise that Riley’s second 2024 book came out with that selfsame title, Black Liturgies, subtitled Prayers, Poems and Meditations for Staying Human. Both of these books are New York Times bestsellers. It, too, is deeply moving and tender, an affecting collection of poems, prayers, ‘letters’ and spiritual practices that draw a person into meditation and prayer over some of the same subjects she writes on in her first book; but then the last half of the book presents liturgical and meditative resources on holidays and seasons of the church year. I recommend both of these books highly.

This brings me to the prayer I’d like to share on my blog this month from the book Black Liturgies, Riley’s third chapter entitled Place, and the prayer, “For the Land:”

God of creature and sky,

We have not protected the divine in all of creation. We have forgotten our origins, placing ourselves as superior to the very earth that formed us. Humble us, God; shake us from the belief that we are capable of ruling over the earth when we cannot even care for humanity. Remind us just how young we are in comparison to the cosmos. We are no saviors; make us learners. Make us listen for and heed the quiet things whispered by the soil and sea. Free us from our narcissism as we look on the suffering of other creatures and find our souls at last stirred. And as we become honest about our flagrant degradation of land, may we protect those countries and peoples who have disproportionately suffered the greed of the powerful. May we listen to the Indigenous wisdom in our midst, those who have long warned us that this land does not belong to us – that our ownership of it is our collective delusion. As we look up from the lie, may we find tree and star and dirt, and become the earth’s meekest disciples and fiercest protectors. Amen.

I will let this beautiful prayer speak for itself, and urge you to join with me in praying it.

~~ RGM, January 30, 2025

From My Nature Journal: A Walk in the Woods and a Missing Piece in Christian Discipleship

I was fortunate last week to serve as program director of a week-long retreat experience for pastors in our denomination, a retreat we call “Deeper in Christ.” Intended for our clergy in a season of discernment, in need of rest, or simply looking for quality, guided quiet time with God, we do a couple of these a year through the generosity of the Lilly Foundation, and our venue this time was one of our favorites, St. John’s University and Abbey in Collegeville, Minnesota. We had a great week together.

New England has nothing up on Central Minnesota this time of year, and the fall colors were spectacular, even deepening over the several days we were there. In such a setting, and with the warm and inviting weather we experienced, we urged retreatants and staff alike to get out and enjoy the sanctuary of God’s creation every opportunity they could. St. Johns’ property includes vast hardwood and coniferous forests, oak savanna, prairies, wetlands (some complete with boardwalks for up-close inquiry), and gorgeous riparian habitat around a large northwoods lake. Trails completely traverse the property, and one can walk or hike numerous routes without ever stepping foot on the same terrain twice. Wildlife abounds -- deer, squirrels, raccoons, eagles, great blue herons, and songbirds and waterfowl of many kinds. I even nearly stumbled upon a small black bear shortly after dusk one evening. I must say that I always enjoy seeing a bear on a trail, but especially when it is running away from me rather than towards me. 

Benedictine hospitality is also stellar, what with their rule of receiving guests as one would receive Christ. It is one of the things that make this location one of the top three or four retreat centers in our rotation. Even the architecture of the guesthouse takes full advantage of the natural beauty, with large picture windows, patios and terraces overlooking woods and water views. Fall color? In various coniferous greens along with the deciduous reds, yellows, oranges and golds of the hardwoods, it is truly a varied palette. And the trees? There are red and white pine, even some jack, red and sugar maple, white birch, poplar, cottonwood, red and white oak, black and blue spruce, hemlock, ironwood, balsam fir, tamarack, eastern white cedar and willow, let alone many smaller species -- but just as colorful an assortment – such as dogwood, alder and a nearly breathtaking sumac. 

One late afternoon, several of us staff went out to walk a trail together before the dinner hour. We all were smitten by beauty upon beauty as we navigated the trail up and down through its varying topography, and my dear friend and sister in Christ Debbie turns to me and says, “Rick, how is it that we appreciate so much the beautiful diversity of a forest and yet struggle so much in our culture to appreciate and see the beauty of human diversity?” Debbie has been a respected leader for many years in our denomination in the area of Christian formation, and one of her many specialties has been justice ministries as we have worked to pursue a missing piece of evangelical discipleship, that of racial righteousness and reconciliation. An African-American, she recruited me many years ago to help resource this important work among our pastors and churches, and it has been one of the most meaningful labors of my career, and Debbie one of my most beloved mentors. She continued, “I sit on the guesthouse deck or in my room and treasure the beauty of diversity displayed before my eyes, and I ask, ‘Why? Why is it so hard in the human realm?’”

What an important question. Why indeed? 

There’s no question as to whether nature thrives in diversity. It always has. Even in cultivated settings, a large rose garden of the same hue of red hardly captures the beauty of one with a variety of colors. In fact any garden with all the same flower, say, yellow lilies, scarcely captures the senses like a garden with varying textures, colors, sizes and shapes. Even a basket of mixed fruits portrays a greater attraction than a bowl of green grapes. And then I think about farming practices and what we call our economies of scale that result in vast monocultures, whether Midwestern corn or overseas palm oil plantations. These all end up requiring pesticides and fertilizing chemicals to replenish the soil with what would be produced naturally if the culture were more diverse. Now I can’t go far on this subject because I know very little about farming, but the point is made. Nature thrives in diversity.

...How is it that we appreciate so much the beautiful diversity

of a forest and yet struggle so much in our culture to 

appreciate and see the beauty of human diversity?

Yet forests and gardens and farming are one thing. Cultural diversity is completely another. The challenges of forestry and agriculture, though very important in the realm of creation care (another oft-missed piece in Christian discipleship), usually seem infinitely simpler than the racial challenges we face. And yet the reason I write this blog is because I find, again and again, that nature has very important things to teach us, and that what it teaches is confirmed over and over in the Bible. God’s word could not be clearer than it is on the beauty of the human family -- all people -- created in God’s very image. 

So it’s still early enough in the fall that there is a LOT of color out there. What are called ‘leafers’ or ‘leaf-peepers’ are out in droves, as usual, whether visiting the beauty of the northeast or northwoods, the aspen golds of Colorado, the diverse majesty of the Appalachians, or the western larch’s flaming yellows in the Northern Rockies. Do this for me: next time you’re appreciating fall color somewhere, say a prayer of appreciation for human diversity and for a personal commitment to racial reconciliation, a critically missing piece in Christian discipleship. Then act on that prayer.

Get outside.

~~ RGM, October 17, 2024

From My Nature Journal: Beulah Land

Strange name for a blogpost? Perhaps. Beulah is one of those unique Bible names, used just once to make a particular point; I happened to come across it again a couple days ago, and it struck me in a way it had not before. Stick with me for a bit.

Somewhere in my early childhood, my family knew an older woman by that name, though I cannot recall anything further than that. Thus my oldest memories are that it was a woman’s name. Then while working the mailroom in our denominational publishing house during grad school, I found it was the name of one of our churches in California. Strange name for a church, I thought, a woman’s name. Must have been quite a lady. Just kidding, but I obviously did not recall the Bible verse or know the meaning at the time. 

A post-exilic text from the Prophet Isaiah, it was written several hundred years prior to the birth of Jesus Christ, intended to give encouragement to the long-oppressed and exiled people of Israel, and it reads thus: “You shall no more be called Forsaken, and your land shall no more be termed Desolate. But you shall be called My Delight Is In Her, and your land Beulah (that is, married) [Isaiah 62:4].”

A land called Married. Hmmm…

The term ‘Beulah Land’ was used by John Bunyan in Pilgrim’s Progress. It referred to a city of incredible peace found as one approached the end of the Christian journey, near the border of the Celestial City. From Beulah Land, one could begin to sense the beauties and character of Heaven itself. The term and its heaven themes were also picked up by several gospel hymn writers of the 19th Century, including Fanny Crosby (see hymn lyrics here). 

But a land called Married. Just think on that a bit…

Now, of course, much political dispute and bitter conflict takes place over ‘possession’ of that (hardly) peaceful Beulah land this past century, the land of Israel. Whose land is it? Who was there first? Has God metaphysically granted it as a physical possession? To whom? Who gains by right of conquest? Which conquest? Can two hotheaded cultures possibly share it, especially when some subcultures within are bent on the utter destruction of the other? What would need to happen for that sharing, or at least coexisting, to take place? It is perhaps the worst conundrum on the face of the planet, and often seems an intractable dilemma. Perhaps it is because both groups feel married to the land. And I don’t think that is how the text is to be understood anyway.

But stay there for a moment in a different way. What is marriage after all? And this is where my mind has gone these last couple of days since running across the Biblical text again. A different nuance of the ‘married to the land’ concept keeps occurring to me, not one of possessiveness or control, but one of sacrifice, perhaps even one that could help us all become better stewards of God’s creation.

Gail and I just celebrated our 48th anniversary this month. We learned long ago that some of the keys to a healthy marriage – with the most important being welcoming God at the center of our relationship – are to build each other up, to affirm each other and cherish one another, committing ourselves every single day to honor and bless the other rather than to take advantage of or exploit, certainly not to hurt. A marriage partner is not to be used (let alone abused) for one’s sole advantage.

What if our relationship to the land was similar? What if we saw ourselves as married to the land in this way? What if we also then saw land as not simply to be used (and certainly not abused), not to be exploited, but rather tenderly cared for, caressed, loved, honored? Again, what if our relationship to the land was not about possession but sacrifice? Like a very REAL relationship? What could be different? And of course as I muse on this, I think about the two little acres Gail and I are blessed to ‘own’ on this terrestrial orb (see Psalm 24:1), an acre plus in the northwoods of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and another on Whidbey Island in Washington. Not a day goes by that we don’t feel gratitude for these small parcels. We love them. We are intimate with them. We know every nook and cranny, every contour, every plant and animal (OK, at least the majority), practically every single tree or rotting log on them. And we would never want them to be anything other than what they are, a simple and natural place for an abode. Far be it from us to hurt them. And it is a true truth that love is always the first step to fully caring for something, caring for it in a way that IT needs, not that WE need (though I am glad that what our two acres need and what we need are not in conflict with each other). 

This is vastly closer to an indigenous philosophy of the land than is the typical possession/consumption/exploitation model to which most of the world has become accustomed (which is not only Western, by the way). It seems that indigenous persons the world over held (and in some places, still hold) to a philosophy of a literal relationship with the land, going so far as to see the land and everything upon it as a relative. I like that very much.

Come to find out that the church named Beulah was adjacent to some of the richest and most fertile farmland of California’s amazing Central Valley, which makes me wonder if its founders had a line on this ‘married to the land’ idea long ago. What beauty could occur (and what healing might transpire) if we loved the land as if we were married to it? 

~~ RGM, August 20, 2024

From My Nature Journal on Earth Day: “…That Nothing May Be Lost”

I don’t want to make too much of it, but it seemed more than a coincidence. It was Earth Day, and I had been thinking a lot about that as the holiday approached. I was doing something completely common that day, practically an everyday experience, reading and thinking through a Bible passage. On that particular day the text happened to be an account jammed with familiarity, the Gospel text of Jesus’ miraculous feeding of the five thousand, perhaps the most well-known miracle story in the Bible, one that many others and I recall from our earliest childhood days. 

But the story clips along familiarly. Late in the story Jesus has already done the unbelievable, the people have all been fed, and near the close of the account, as it is told, Jesus does a very pedestrian thing: he asks his helpers to gather up all the leftover pieces, “…that nothing may be lost.”  That phrase hit me in a curious way. I’ve seen it a million times, but perhaps never on an Earth Day. 

Consider this image of a vast number of people the likes of which you and I have only seen at a professional sporting or entertainment event. They eat until satiated, the account says. That’s a lot of food. But with all these people there is no doubt an enormous mess to clean up after lunch – fish bones, utensils and receptacles of sorts -- work done with twenty thousand or more oily hands (the text says ‘five thousand men;’ women and children would have at least doubled the number), fully two hundred thousand greasy fingers. And Jesus asks that the leftovers not be forgotten. I’m not sure what would have been done with them that day. The text doesn’t indicate it, though I have personally witnessed a feeding ministry in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, where edible table scraps were gathered in large plastic buckets after hundreds had been fed, and then made available to the latecomers. Hunger is hunger.

But, “…that nothing may be lost,” Jesus said. 

Now, that was not a philosophy that would be new to Jesus. In numerous places he teaches about the value of lost things being found. Lost things are worth going after. Especially lost people. “I have come to seek and save the lost,” he even lovingly said. It seems his philosophy with people was the same as his philosophy with food scraps. Still, it was delightful to me on that Earth Day to reflect on the fact that Jesus was concerned that no food be wasted. 

So very much is lost in our consumer culture, so very much wasted. What if we lived by the philosophy that nothing of true value be lost? Yet, wherever humans have seemed to set foot, God’s creation almost always has degraded. 

God’s creation in its natural state, untrammeled by people, has an uncanny way also of not wasting anything. Poet, naturalist, author and innovation consultant Janine Benyus is the creative mind behind the philosophical concept of ‘biomimicry,’ defined as ‘the practice of learning from nature, then imitating what we find.’ It is a fascinating subject. (More can be found here.) But here is the crux of the concept in Benyus’ own words:

Nature runs on sunlight.

Nature uses only the energy it needs.

Nature fits form to function.

Nature recycles everything.

Nature rewards cooperation.

Nature banks on diversity.

Nature demands local expertise.

Nature curbs excesses from within.

Nature taps the power of limits.

In short, Benyus insists, nature ‘relentlessly creates conditions conducive to life.’ 

So does God, in lots of ways. And there’s no question in my mind whether or not God intended that very same thing with his creation. I believe God did. You and I, as co-sustainers with God of God’s good earth, are stewards, an old word that means we care for something as if it were our own, with the commitment to return it in as good or better of a condition than when we received it. 

It is not too late. Whether it’s Earth Month or not, take hold of the miracle that is creation. Honor it. Cherish it. And work to see that we lose nothing.

~~ RGM, April 24 2024

Blowin’ in the Wind: “Seasons of Nature” -- by Ilana

("Blowin’ in the Wind" is a periodic feature on my blog containing an assortment of nature writings – songs, excerpts, poems, prayers, Bible readings or other things – pieces written by others but that inspire me or give me joy. I trust they’ll do the same for you.)

I know I just did a “BitW” feature last month, and I cannot recall if I’ve ever shared a work by a family member, but I cannot resist avoiding either of these this month. My wife Gail and I just received a special gift from our eight-year-old granddaughter Ilana, and it tickled us so that I thought you might appreciate it as well. 

Each of our eleven grandchildren has their own special personality, and we love every one of them more than life itself. Ilana? She is a beautiful child full of the wonder of life, and of the love both of people and of God’s creation. She is also a ton of fun to be around in spite of the fact that she sometimes tells me I have been demoted to ‘the second-funniest person in the family’ behind our son, her Uncle Jarrett. But that never lasts long, and she typically and appropriately restores me to the throne quite quickly. (Sorry, Jarrett...)

And the girl DOES love God’s creation! It is always a pleasure to hike with her because she notices things, a key characteristic of nature lovers and all of us who find in nature an important spiritual pathway to God. She also calls herself Grandpa’s ‘nature companion’ whenever she and I hop on our ATV and pick up trash along the county road near our Michigan cabin. In other words, she is already concerned about Earth care. It’s therefore fitting that her name is even natural: ‘ilana’ is one of several Hebrew words for ‘tree,’ most often associated with oaks. That was not surprising when we first heard her name after her birth, as her father is a horticulturist, though I don’t know if that had anything to do with it at the time!

Upon our arrival for a visit last month, Ilana told Gail and me she had something for us, then with a shy smile gave us the hand-printed original of a poem she had written a few days before during a rest time she and her sibs take after lunch. We thought it precious, and so I present to you here Ilana’s “Seasons of Nature,” with her spellings and punctuation intact. Enjoy!

When the first snowflakes fall

When one by one they start then thousands shimer in the sky

When fluffy snow covers everything

When sparkling white they glisten megestic do they look

When few sounds nor animals are there only robins or none

Then do you know that Winter is here.

When the drifts are small yet get smaller each day

When the flowers peek from the wet soil

When the air is warm and damp

When animals wake up and continue their lives

When the areas are colerful 

Then do you know that spring is here

When the leaves on the trees turn green

When the air is schorching

When water is the want for outside fun

When ice cream and cold treats turn from a cream to a liquid faster than a hummingbird

When animals are everywhere trees, grass, sky

Then do you know that summer is here

When the air becomes colder and jackets required

When the leaves turn vibrant colers of yellow, orange and, bloodred

When nuts fall to the ground

When animals scurry to get food and store it for winter

When people start getting snow shovels and hot chochlate

Then do you know that Autum is here

I want to live nowhere else for

Seasons Make a year a year.

And, oh, I can’t forget her dedication from the back of the page: 

Dedicated

To

Papa and

Grandma

Whom love

Me and Nature

Very much

With Love

Isn’t that delightful? The simple, fresh and wondering thoughts of a child… amazingly compelling. 

I don’t know if you’ve paid attention to a malady that is oft-touted by psychologists over the last two decades, but the dysfunction has to do with nature deprivation. Exposure to the natural world has been proven to improve mental, social and emotional health in profound ways, to say nothing of the spiritual dimension of celebrating the beauty of the Lord’s sanctuary. Nature outings are being prescribed as treatment for both adults and kids. We’d all do our children and grandchildren an enormous service by getting them outdoors regularly, establishing natural rhythms and opportunity for healing while they are young, whether they are super eager to go or not. 

Please excuse my diversion into preaching -- it’s an occupational hazard! So skip that paragraph, take a deep breath, let it out slowly, and go back and read Ilana’s poem again. Then getcha self outdoors at the next possible opportunity.

~~ From a Grandpa ‘whom’ loves his grand-

children and nature very, VERY much, 

RGM, March 19 2024

Blowin’ in the Wind: Mary Oliver -- “My Work is Loving the World”

("Blowin’ in the Wind" is a periodic feature on my blog containing an assortment of nature writings – songs, excerpts, poems, prayers, Bible readings or other things – pieces I haven’t written but that inspire me or give me joy. I trust they’ll do the same for you.)

I want to share with you today a poem from one of my favorites, Mary Oliver. My sister-in-law Beth recommended her to me one time when I was visiting her and my brother’s home. And what do you know? There just happened to be a book of Oliver’s poetry there at the bedstand in their guest bedroom. Once I found that my hosts went to bed a lot earlier than me, it gave me plenty of opportunity that visit to spend some time with her writing. 

Mary Oliver was an American poet who died in 2019. A Pulitzer Prize winner for her 1983 American Primitive, much of her work has a natural bent to it, which is what attracts me to it. Some of her critics call her too accessible, but to me, that is hardly a criticism but a compliment. When it comes to poetry, I need accessibility! Though not a woman of declared religion, I find not infrequent references to the divine or sacred in her work, which is welcome to me as a person of faith. Having written twenty books of poetry and six of prose, her collection Devotions is a compilation of many favorites written over a fifty year span from the 60’s to the twenty-tens, and would be a great place for new readers to begin.

The poem I share here is titled “Messenger” from her 2006 collection Thirst. Her life-long habit of solitary walks, and the place these played in her inspiration, may easily be imagined.

My work is loving the world.

Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird--

equal seekers of sweetness.

Here the quickening yeast; there the blue plums.

Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

 

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?

Am I no longer young, and still half-perfect? Let me

keep my mind on what matters…

 

which is mostly standing still and learning to be

astonished.

The robin, the rosehips.

The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.

Which is mostly rejoicing,

since all the ingredients are here,

 

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart

and these body-clothes,

a mouth with which to give shouts of joy

to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,

telling them all, over and over, how it is

that we live forever.

What are three of the important things that matter? Not only in natural observation but in life? Astonishment, joy and gratitude, she says. These not only build a life but call us deeper into creation care, because we care for the things we love. 

My work is loving the world. Not a bad gig. Sounds like Jesus.

~~ RGM, February 29 2024

From My Nature Journal: A Via Dolorosa for All Creation, OR, A Creation Care Lenten Lament

As our Lenten journey continues this year, I’ve come across a resource that has captured my spirit a good bit. It’s called Stations of the Cross with All of Creation, an expansive prayer experience of the long traditional Stations of the Cross. And though I do not know that this resource is completely original to this particular group, the 2010 copy I have in my possession is attributed to an organization called the Intercommunity Peace & Justice Center (www.ipjc.org), an extensive coalition of Catholic organizations in the Pacific Northwest, largely female.

Lent, of course, can appropriately be a season of lament, as one considers the sacrifices and sufferings of Jesus Christ on our behalf. The traditional Stations of the Cross themselves are a spiritual practice of prayer that follow the actual experiences of Jesus in the Gospels from the moment he is condemned by Pontius Pilate to his burial in the tomb. These Stations can differ slightly from tradition to tradition, and can be from twelve to fifteen in number; some even end with Jesus’ resurrection rather than his burial. In any way that it is prayed, however, it is meant to be something of a vicarious pilgrimage of the actual holy sites in Jerusalem along what is called Jesus’ Via Dolorosa, his Journey of Sorrows. Perhaps some of you have been there, as have I, beginning at what is called the Ecce Homo Arch, the traditional site of Pilate’s spoken words, “Behold, the man…” (John 19:5).

Over the last thirty years or so, I have found the Stations a very meaningful spiritual practice. So imagine my delight this Lent, as one who finds nature an important spiritual pathway, to come across Stations of the Cross with All of Creation. Basically, it’s a resource that parallels the lament of the Stations of the Cross with a lament for the environmental devastation being experienced in our modern day.  Some may say, “Well, THAT sure sounds political.” But for all of us who are deeply concerned about Creation Care, and about our responsibilities as Christ followers to steward the good gift that God has given us, it is not political at all. There is indeed much to lament when it comes to earth’s degradation, yet, indeed, much also that God’s people can do to steward the earth more carefully than they historically have. Filled with Scripture, quotes and questions for reflection, this resource attends to both aspects of this issue, lament and hope.

The parallels are very interesting to me. Let me see if I can summarize them as briefly as I can:

·      Station 1 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus’ condemnation by Pilate -- to the simple issue of environmental condemnation.

·      Station 2 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus taking up the cross -- with our being willing to ‘take up the cross’ of a role in better creation care, while understanding our complicity in the problem.

·      Station 3 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus’ first fall -- with the need for our concern for those most vulnerable and likely to be most quickly impacted by earth’s degradation. 

·      Station 4 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus meeting his mother along the way – to our need for a better understanding of the Earth as mother of all God’s creation.

·      Station 5 couples the traditional station depicting Simon of Cyrene’s forced recruitment to help Jesus carry his cross – with the admonition, again, that we might bear this cross, that we might live more simply so that others may simply live.

·      Station 6 couples the traditional station depicting St. Veronica’s wiping the face of Jesus – to ways in which we can work toward a cleaner environment.

·      Station 7 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus’ second fall – with concerns regarding the recent dramatic increase in the extinction of our home’s species.

·      Station 8 couples the traditional station depicting the women of Jerusalem weeping – with the degradation of the earth’s waters.

·      Station 9 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus’ third fall – to the degradation of the earth’s air.

·      Station 10 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus being stripped of his garments – with issues of global deforestation.

·      Station 11 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus being nailed to the cross – to our overdependence on fossil fuels and the environmental devastation and political turmoil that ensues.

·      Station 12 couples the traditional station depicting Jesus’ death on the cross – to the invitation to greater activism by all God’s people in creation care.

Once again, I can imagine some readers rolling their eyes in repugnance at some of these parallels, or others wondering if they may be irreverent or sacrilegious. But as I’ve reflected on them, I see all kinds of appropriate correlations, connections and admonitions. God’s redemptive plan is for God’s entire creation, and I am always eager to see more and more people drawn into environmental stewardship. If simple things like this can move some people forward, I’m all for it.

But here is another reason why I am enthusiastic about this resource. Since moving here to Western Washington, I’ve become involved with a church-based group called Greening Congregations Collaborative; it’s a team consisting of reps from seven or eight nearby churches who want to share ideas and create shared events and experiences that can draw more and more of their congregants to better creation care. Our GCC has adapted Stations of the Cross with All of Creation into a Lenten worship experience we call Way of Sorrows for All Creation, which we will present during Holy Week. I’ve taken a lead role in the revision and look forward to facilitating it on April 17, 4pm at Langley United Methodist Church. Let me know if you might be interested in receiving a copy of the liturgy we are preparing.

Meanwhile, look the list of stations over one more time, and prayerfully consider the sacrifice and generosity of Christ for you, as well as our call to be more sacrificial and generous stewards of God’s good earth.

~~ RGM, March 25 2019

P.S. Some of you will recall that I published here on my blog some time ago a resource I’ve written called Stations of Creation.  It is something that I’ve also presented extensively while leading retreats or events that highlight nature as a spiritual pathway. It can be an interesting companion experience to Stations of the Cross with All Creation. You may find Stations of Creation here.