Finding Ourselves Again

If you have ever gone to The Five Rivers Environmental Center and sat in the shelter and looked up, you would have seen a sign which reads, “I come here to find myself; it is so easy to get lost in the world.”

John Burroughs, America’s great naturalist and writer, spent time in the Catskills at a lodge and it is from that experience that this saying originates.   Burroughs found renewal by being immersed in the beauty, quiet and grandeur of the natural world.  I think we do too. It was from that renewal that he was strengthened to go forth and to do the work to which he felt called.

 We too can find ourselves again as we sit and delight in some natural spot.  Doing so feeds us and makes us fall in love with Creation all over again.  Being immersed in the wonder of a natural area, with pines towering up into the air, like  pillars in a great cathedral reaching up to the ceiling, one becomes aware that the whole of Creation is God’s Great Cathedral and in that realization we find ourselves again.

When we see things in a deeper and clearer way than before, it is because we have been touched and changed within. We realize the beauty and the great value and importance of Creation itself.  This produces the inner energy and desire that leads one into working for the well being of Creation itself.  That is what the work of Creation Care is about. 

The work of Creation Care and the season of Lent, which the church is now observing, have a common element at the core, in that both of them entail change.   In Greek the word for repentance is “metanoia” which means literally a change of mind or a change of direction.

Our spiritual and physical well bring and the well being of the earth hinge upon  “metanoia’.  It is in a change of heart and mind and a change of direction that will find ourselves again.   

Submitted by Larry Deyss, Member of the CRICCC Education Committee       

Feeding our souls for the work of creation care

One of the things that drew me to CRICCC some years ago was that it was an interfaith organization.  The faith part was particularly attractive to me because I think that our work of creation care can be sustained only by a strong spiritual core.

I am also aware that with the press of many climate change issues it is easy to get caught up in the work and forget the importance of attending to our spiritual core. It is therefore important for us to ask, “What am I doing to feed my soul?  What are my daily practices?  Do I have any and if so what are they?”  These practices do not need to be elaborate.  They can be quite simple.  For me they consist of a morning ritual of coffee after breakfast, watching birds at the feeder and delighting in them as part of the wonder of creation.  I read the lessons from the daily prayer app and do some contemplation and journal writing.   That is what works for me, others hopefully have their centering and renewing practices which are vital for spiritual health and the work we are called to do.  

While we need time for solitude and our faith practices for the renewing of our souls, we are also people who are made for community.  It is in community that we hear one another’s stories, and their struggles and victories.  In our very individualist society we do not do much of that kind of sharing and if we don’t, then maybe we should think about doing so. Actually this is not hard to do.  In groups that I lead, be it an administrative body or a book group, every meeting begins with checking in with one another and listening and being supportive.

Building community is part of the work of building a healthy and sustainable creation. 

Submitted by Larry Deyss, Member of the CRICCC Education Committee