Читать книгу How Can I Care for Creation? - Stephanie McDyre Johnson - Страница 7

Introduction

I grew up in the Hudson River Valley, in a small farming town about sixty miles north of New York City. When I imagine the Hudson River with its gently sloping hills and meandering riverbed, I feel a deep sense of connectedness to God’s earth. The seasons are vivid in the valley, from brightly colored red and orange leaves in the fall, to the mint green buds in the spring, the flourishing vibrancy of the summer growth, to the starkness of the winter snow against the barren trees.

It is here along the Hudson River where I experience a profound sense that God knows me and I know God. In the midst of creation there is but a small separation between heaven and earth; a thin space where the presence of the Divine is palpable.

This knowledge of God’s presence in nature is one that many people experience. When I lead talks on creation care, I invite people to reflect on where they most deeply experience God. Most often the response is tied to nature—on the top of a mountain, standing at the side of the ocean, in a quiet forest, or even an urban park. Sometimes these experiences of God in nature are memories that include childhood or family gatherings, a powerful reminder of our interdependent relationship with both people and nature.

My memories of the Hudson River Valley cover decades of my life. As a child I recall being on the Hudson Clearwater sloop, an educational experience led by environmental activist and folk musician Pete Seeger. Beginning in the 1960s and continuing until his death in 2014, Seeger was a leading voice in raising awareness of the fragility of the land, water, and air. He engaged people through both his music and environmental educational initiatives. With his vision, Seeger created an experience of sailing on the Clearwater as educators taught both sailors and guests about the ecology and environmental degradation of the river.

Thus my elementary school memories in the 1970s include a field trip on the Clearwater, learning about the pollution coming primarily from upstream factories. I would discover later that the pollution included PCBs, chemicals that were destroying fish, particularly the shad that had been running in the Hudson for centuries. But from that short field trip, I retained a searing memory of a polluted river that was essentially dead. Over the years that “educational sail” would come back to me as a stark reminder of the ability humans retain to nearly destroy the environment.

When I began a career as an environmental planner and educator, it became clear to me that local environmental issues could often be addressed by engagement with various community stakeholders. For me, that area of focus was the New York City watershed, which included the areas of upstate New York not far from where I grew up.

More than twenty-five years after my Clearwater sloop field trip, I would take my two elementary school–aged children to our local beach on the Hudson River, a waterway earnestly restored to life through the efforts of new laws and local advocacy. We often attended the annual Hudson River Clearwater Festival which marked the resiliency of the waters, the return of healthy fish, and the committed engagement of the communities around the river.

During my years as an environmental professional, I liked to talk about “doing the right thing” for the environment, as my husband and I raised our children in the Hudson River Valley, the backdrop of a thriving, resurrected habitat. Yet some part of me felt a certain lack of conviction that “doing the right thing” was enough of a motivation to continue working toward environmental protection. All too often environmental activists became burned out in their passion, and ecological issues were seen by many as a fringe concern in the face of so many other pressing local and regional issues.

When I entered seminary in 2007, I believed that my career as an environmentalist was over. As I turned my eyes toward priestly ordination in the Episcopal Church and arrived at Berkeley Divinity School at Yale, I began to realize that my sense of calling was not only to ordained ministry, but to a broader ministry of care for creation, or eco-ministry. At Berkeley, as in many other seminaries, programs are offered to educate lay and clergy leaders in the theology, environmental ethics, and biblical interpretation of care of creation. Somehow, with God’s guidance, I wound up in a seminary that, along with the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology based in the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies, helped me make the connection between my lifelong love of God and my care for the earth.

Taking classes and talking to seminarians and professors who were also deeply committed to this, I was inspired to finally consider that taking care of the environment was not a matter of “doing the right thing,” but rather a matter of loving and caring for all that God loves. Through the grace of God, my career as an environmentalist and my calling to ordained ministry became one.

This little book is your invitation into a similar journey of exploration. Perhaps you are a committed environmentalist who sees your faith life separately like I did. Perhaps you are a concerned environmental activist who is burned out on feeling a sense of responsibility for the work and are seeking God’s presence in the ministry. Perhaps you are in despair and face a sense of hopelessness over the relentless news of climate change because of its current and future impacts on the earth. Perhaps you sense the wonder and joy of God in creation and long to celebrate today, while protecting it for future generations. Or maybe you experience all these things.

Wherever you are on your spiritual journey, I hope this book offers you a sense of possibility and boundless hope for all of God’s creation.