April 26, 2015: May God’s words alone be spoken, may God’s words alone be heard. Amen.
Today we are celebrating Earth Day, which officially was this past Wednesday. Now, I know for many of us, just the mention of eco-anything, or “going green” can send us into hiding for fear somebody will find out we drive an SUV or occasionally forget to bring the canvas shopping bag into the grocery store. I am guilty on both counts. But that is not what this day, or Earth Day, is all about. Not really.
44 years ago this week, Earth Day was launched. 44 years…so much has changed, and so much is left to do. I remember when I was a little girl, when traveling in my parents in our 57 chevy station wagon along the highways and byways, litter stretched out for miles. This being before the No Littering laws, folks just tossed their garbage out the windows of the car as it was hurtling down the highway. And even though the ‘Keep America Beautiful Campaign’ started in the mid-sixties, there was still far too much truth in the commerical that ran on Earth Day in 1974. It featured Chief Iron Eyes Cody, a Native American, canoeing through a garbarge filled river – how many remember that commercial…. with him at the end, standing beside a road as trash, tossed from a passing car, slams against his feet. The camera zooms into his face, and we see a tear drop. It had an impact, and things did change.
But, it sees the more things change, the more they stay the same. It is true that the sights I saw when I was young, fast food bags and other trash spread along the median strips, are mostly a thing of the past. Yes, we have moved our trash from where we can see it – to where we cannot.
But before we travel down this environmental road any further, let’s back up a bit. Because, like so many injustices in our society, from racism to homophobia, the bible has been used to justify humanity’s “right” to do with creation what we will. After all, we were given “dominion” over it, right? Oddly enough, it is sometimes Christian’s own misunderstanding of the bible that leads us down a slippery path. Barbara Brown Taylor, an Episcopal priest and prolific author (in fact, her book, “An Altar in the World” is our book club’s reading this month) once wrote about the biblical understanding of humanity and creation. She noted that we were not only the last things to be created, we shared that sixth day with, as she puts it “cows for God’’s sake!”1 She writes “God gave us dominion, it is true, but God did NOT prounounce us better than anything else God made.” In fact, it seems God was rather ho-hum about the whole sixth day – maybe getting a bit tired…. afterall, lots of creating going on and all. The point is – everything in the story that was created – sun, moon, stars, sky, sea, birds, land and sea animals, and humans, all of it was greeted with the same “it was good.” Not, you cows and other animals…you’re good, but boy you humans…you’re awesome! No, just “it was good.” And, it was! And it is…but perhaps not for long.
So, let’s get back to that garbage, you know, the garbage that used to be on the roads? Take a look at the garbage sculptures our youth group built last week. Aren’t they great? (to see the pictures, click here: https://christchurchepiscopal.org/index.php/nggallery/2015/youth-group-transformative-art?page_id=348) Someone told me that it is really called “Transformative Art”, and I believe that is appropriate, because as I look at it, it transforms me. It transforms me because so much of it used to be in my garage. But seriously, these sculptures – the elephant, dragon, dining scene, light box, and trash man – these sculptures are made of the very things we often throw out. Plastic cups and bottles, boxes, hoses, wire…even the old dirty plexiglass we removed off our stained glass windows, shutters off my house, and an old laundry basket.
The garbage we see here today in these sculptures is a symbol of the massive amount of waste produced by us, a society with unquenchable consumerism. And where does this stuff usually end up? It will end up – not in our neighborhoods, but in the living spaces of “the least of these” – the neighbors we are called by Christ to love. The poor will take it on because they don’t have the money to say “not in my backyard”, they can’t hire the attorneys that will fight the corporations and governments. And they don’t even have the health insurance to get well again, once our pollution enters their system. 85% of the toxic landfills in the United States are located among the poorest in society. Jesus didn’t claim to be the shepherd of just a few, or just those with means, but he said in today’s gospel “there will be one flock, one shepherd.” So we are taking our waste and dumping it where other parts of his flock graze and live. That is no way to be a shepherd. Folks, this is a matter of justice!
In her book, “Breathing Spaces”, Heidi Neumark, a Lutheran pastor of a church in The Bronx writes that the sewage plants, carrying 70% of the city’s waste, were located at Hunt’s Point, in the South Bronx, where as she says the stench can wake you up at night. But it is the children who suffer most, dying of asthma at one of the highest rates in the country. She writes that the children in her community “pack asthma pumps the way other kids pack action figures” into their backpacks.
This is a matter of justice!
For decades, the United States government has enticed the Native Americans on reservations, who already suffer from the injustices our nation committed against them – injustices of mass murder, mass incarceration, and so much more – our government offers them economic incentives to store toxic waste on their land. These incentives are appealing – why? Because of their economic struggles caused by our government. Caused by all of us.
This is a matter of justice.
West Africa has been the dumping ground for industrialized nations, including the United States and Great Britain. Tribal leaders are offered lucrative deals, without warning of the dangers of what they are agreeing to allow on their land. And while Greenpeace and other environmental activists have done what they can to warn villages and towns, the practice continues because the economic despair makes the offer so appealing.
This is a matter of justice.
Deforestation of the rainforests in South America are resulting not only in devistation to plant and animal life in the region, not only in increased levels of carbon dioxide all over the earth, but also an ever growing number of “enviromental refugees.” These refugees are not only pushed from their lands, but are now suffering from health problems previously unknown to them.
This is a matter of justice.
Those with “Climate Change Denier Disease,” as our Presiding Bishop, the Most Rev. Katherine Jefferts Schori (a marine biologist), calls them, have continued to create confusion because the media has decided the fight makes for good ratings, creating a popular perception that there is equal evidence on both sides, rather than report that over 97% of scientists globally have concluded for decades that the climate is changing – it is changing for the worse – it is human caused – and it will soon be too late to do anything to stop it. If that only affected those of us in developed countries who have caused the problem, it might be considered a fair pay back, but as it affects all people – those who had not a single thing to do with it, as well as all the animals and plant life given to us to our care by God…well, again – this is a matter of justice.
And certainly, a matter of justice, is a matter for all Christians.
Jesus was clear, as our epistle from 1 John reminds us today, that we are to – love God, love our neighbor. Our Gospel lesson also tells us as much. Christ is the good shepherd. We, the body of Christ, are to be shepherds as well. Shepherds care for their flock and for all that sustains their flock. We are a part of a large and wonderful mosaic of creation – a beautiful gift of God, and for that we raise our voices in song today. We started the service with the great hymn “For the beauty of the earth” in which we give thanks for all of creation so freely given to us by God; and, we end with the words of St. Francis of Assisi “All creatures of our God and King, lift up your voices, let us sing,” reminding us of, as he says in the first first “Dear mother earth, [who] day by day unfold your blessings on our way.” These words of St. Francis are a celebration of God’s creation freely given to us. But perhaps most striking are the words of our communion hymn. The first verse we will sing is “God who stretched the spangled heavens infinite in time and place, flung the suns in burning radiance through the silent fields of space: we, your children in your likeness, share inventive powers with you; Great Creator, still creating, show us what we yet may do.
Yes God, show us what we yet may do to be the good shepherds Jesus calls us to be, to care for all that you have given to us, so that this earth, our island home created by you, may be for all creatures a place that is healthy and safe. Because from the looks of it, we seem to be lost.
In the face of this injustice, we have lost our way.
And I think it is because, like most justice issues, the problem can feel so insurmountable. It can seem that it is just too big a problem to overcome – what can my one light bulb, or one plastic bottle do against all of that? I suppose it seemed that way to many who listened to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream of a new world, but perhaps we can do our own refusing to sit in the back of the bus. Perhaps it is in the footsteps of Rosa Parks that we should walk – one step, one action, one statement that says – NO MORE!
And with God’s help, we can make a difference!
We can act locally, just as we think globally, starting with our own consumerism, energy consumption, and waste disposal. Small changes have already had an effect, as companies are scrambling for our dollar with higher milage cars, and “green” products. Money talks! And, by lessening our environmental impact, we also reduce the downstream effect on our poorer neighbors. But we cannot stop there.
As stewards of creation, as Christians, we must also stand up for those who have no voice, we must engage in a sustained fight for the rights of others to live in a clean and healthy environment. We must live the words into action. We must be the good shepherds we are called to be as followers of Christ. And we don’t have to do that alone.
Some church and advocacy groups are pooling together to buy up rainforest to prevent development. We could work with the many other faith groups in our community, pooling our resources, or work as our vestry committed to last year, with the GreenFaith organization. The possibilities are endless…but only if we bring them into being, only if we ask God to guide us. Because God will always guide us when we seek to do the work of Christ. Always.
With every step – big or small – we will be letting the world know that we will NOT abandon our brothers and sisters, we will NOT abandon God’s creatures of land and air and sea, and we will NEVER turn a blind eye to injustice no matter what form it takes.
As our epistle makes clear “Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action…”
Or perhaps more to the point, the epistle today begins with this: “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help?”
Let us show the world that God’s love abides in us.
Let us love as we are commanded to love.
And, Let us be the shepherds Christ calls us to be.
Because this earth, this fragile island home, given to us by God, is crying out for help. Our neighbors, entrusted to us to be loved, to be cared for, are hurting because of us. Each one of us can make a difference.
Let us love in truth and action.
Amen.
1 Taylor, Barbara Brown, “Dominion of Love” The Green Bible. New York, NY: HarperCollins, 2008. Print.
[Sermons as written may not be as delivered on any given Sunday]Rev. Diana L. Wilcox
Christ Church in Bloomfield & Glen Ridge
April 26, 2015
The Fourth Sunday Of Easter
1st Reading – Acts 4:5-12
Psalm 23
2nd Reading – 1 John 3:16-24
Gospel – John 10:11-18
