You are invited to the Official Opening of the next St. Luke's Art Space Opening.
Saturday 2nd October 2010 at 3pm, to be opened by Elder Ray McMinn.
Performances by local Indigenous Dances, 'Minning Minni Kawrine'.
Local Harpist Nishila.
Light Refreshments will be served.
RSVP 4344 1347 by 27th September.
Saturday, September 18, 2010
Monday, September 13, 2010
Sermon for Fauna Sunday in the Season of Creation
Sermon for ‘Flora and Fauna Sunday’ in the Season of Creation,
in the parish of Woy Woy 12 September 2010, by Jonathan Inkpin
Years ago in the east end of London, I once met a remarkable old lady. She was what some call a ‘bag lady’: a homeless woman who carries her possessions with her, perhaps in just a pair of plastic bags. Her story was typical of many homeless people, although also very unique, like those of every homeless person. In this lady’s case, she would tell a very brief biographical tale on a kind of continuous loop, beginning with the words ‘I was a Barnados girl’ which, when she repeated would start her off again on her abbreviated life story. Was she then a sad person lost in a tiny, poor and very vulnerable world, cut off from the rest of us? No, not exactly. For she was in some ways much more in touch with existence than most, if not all of us. For this seeming poor and aged waif had a remarkable quality: the ability to see the plants and animals alive around her, even in the middle of such a busy and environmentally threatening city as London. If you walked along with her for just a minute or two, your eyes and ears would be opened to the animal and plant life you almost always missed: the grass and the sometimes beautiful flowers which pushed through the concrete and the cracks; the birds and the insects and the wildlife which, sometimes incomprehensibly, managed to thrive in the otherwise all-too-human jungle of the city. Almost everyone else was too busy or self-obsessed to ‘consider’ these ‘birds of the air’ and ‘lilies of the field’. It took a similarly over-looked human being to notice and celebrate these astonishing signs of God’s resistance. And, as she drew you into such contemplation and celebration, you thereby discovered the presence of mystery and grace.
Do we hear what the animals and plants, the flora and fauna of our world, have to say to us? I wonder how well we do...
Hands up anyone who has learned something from living with, or observing, a bird, or a plant, or an animal...
...which creatures have ‘spoken’ to you?
Surely all of us have learned something from the animals and plants of our world. For, as a great Christian mystic (Meister Eckhart) once wrote, ‘every creature is a word of God’. Every creature is part of God’s Creation and everyone, even those we do not like very much (the biting and dangerous creatures perhaps), has something to tell us about life and the nature of the one God, that great creative mystery, in which we all share. Isn’t this what Jesus is saying in today’s Gospel, today’s ‘Good News’? Certainly Jesus’ words challenge us to listen more deeply and learn more fully from the other creatures, the flora and fauna, of our world. As we do, like that ‘bag lady’ I mentioned, we are led into a deeper sense of mystery and God’s grace.
Do we look and listen properly however? Do we really appreciate the other sentient creatures around us? Do we glean from them spiritual wisdom, as Jesus did, or do we regard them too much as merely background additions for our use or entertainment? For we live in an age when this contemplative challenge has become ever more important.
‘Listen humans, this is our world too. For hundreds of millions of years we (the other creatures of this world) have been evolving our ways. Long, long before you came into being, these were rich in our own being. Now our days are coming to a close because of what you are doing. It is time for you to hear us.’ (from Joanna Macy ‘World as Lover. World as Self’ p.188 ff)
Those are words from a highly creative learning exercise known as the ‘Council of All Beings’, developed by the Australian environmental campaigner and educator John Seed and the writer and spiritual teacher Joanna Macy. This exercise has been used in many places, not least schools, to try to enable human beings to engage more empathetically with the sufferings as well as the joys of other creatures than ourselves. It is a highly imaginative and fun activity, which can involve the making of colourful masks and costumes, as each human participant takes on the role of a different creature. Gathered in a circle, this ‘Council of All Beings’ then addresses the human race. In turn, each is asked to share what they feel their particular creature might wish to say to us. Here are a few contributions from one particular gathering...
‘Listen humans, I am lichen. I turn rock into soil. I worked as the glaciers retreated, as other life-forms came and went. I thought nothing could stop me...until now. Now I am being poisoned by acid rain...
Listen humans, I am warbler. Your pesticides are in me now. The eggshells are so fragile they break under my weight, break before my young are ready to hatch..
Listen humans, I am raccoon. I speak for the raccoons. See my hand? It is like yours. On soft ground you see its imprint, and know I’ve passed. What marks on this world are you leaving behind?’
Perhaps we can try to imagine what other creatures might say? Think for a moment, for instance, of a bird or animal precious to you – maybe one of the many beautiful but endangered creatures, such as the large forest owls or squirrel gliders of our own Central Coast. What are they feeling and experiencing? What would they say to us if we listened to them?
The reality of course is that our modern world is very unkind and inhospitable to animals in general. Yes, in some ways human beings do love some other creatures quite well, but these are typically a handful of species we have turned into ‘pets’, like dogs and budgies and, to the extent they can be tamed, cats. Other species however do not fare quite so well. Scandalous numbers of birds and animals are needlessly destroyed and abused each year. Unnecessary extinctions of whole species continue to take place as their numbers and habitats are destroyed by human greed and ignorance. Modern so-called ‘civilisation’ exacts a terrible toll, particularly through its human-centred assumptions and technology.
So what does the God have to say on the matter?...
Well, we have heard from our Gospel today that God cares for the humblest bird and flower. When Jesus says ‘consider the lilies of the field’ and how they are clothed by God, or ‘consider the birds of the air’ and how they are fed by God, he is affirming how important they are to God. If human beings may be counted especially important this therefore does not reduce the value of other animals and plants. Rather it challenges us to share with them the same kind of care and compassion which God displays.
What a difference that would make! We must of course be wary of sentimentality at this point. The other-than human world would not be a paradise if human beings were withdrawn from it. Nature in all its guises is not only a place where God may be revealed. It is also ‘red in tooth and claw’, full of brokenness and violence not merely of human making. Anyone who loves cats for instance, must recognise the capacity of other animals to inflict unnecessary pain. At the heart of much understandable atheism or agnosticism is often a similar awareness of the suffering which is an inextricable part of the Creation as a whole. Greater human kindness to animals will not change this. And yet...
The fundamental affirmation of the Bible is that Creation is ‘good’ and that God seeks to bring all things into perfect harmony. For, as we see from the beginning in the book of Genesis, all things are created to be in relationship with one another. The earth and the heavens, the animals and the plants, and, finally, human beings, all are created to live in partnership with one another, not exploitation. One of the deepest expressions of this is found in the book of Isaiah (ch.11 vv.6-9), where the prophet speaks of God’s intent that:
‘the wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain (says God); and the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.’
Wow! That is truly a ‘new Creation’, isn’t it?!
Indeed it is. For this is part of the messianic promise: the vision of the new Creation which will come about, according to Isaiah, when the Messiah comes. When the Messiah comes, God says, then all the violence in Creation must be ended. This includes the violence suffered and inflicted by animals, as well as the violence humans suffer and inflict on others. The Messianic age may still be ahead of us but it has already begun in Jesus Christ.
So how are we doing with that? Are we living and working towards such a healing of Creation? If so, we might be doing a great deal better in our attitudes and behaviour towards animals, not just the domestic variety. We could be realising afresh that we ourselves are animals and are kith and kin with all other creatures, themselves also valuable in the sight of God. We could be saying ‘no’ to unbridled development and the destruction of eco-systems upon which our fellow sentient creatures depend. We could be reconsidering the amount of meat we eat and the methods of production. We could be dancing with joy like St.Francis at rediscovering our intimate relationship with all the creatures he acknowledged as brother and sister.
‘Consider the lilies of the field.... the birds of the air... the beasts of the field ’ Do we?
I spoke earlier about the imaginative exercise called the ‘Council of All Beings’ and I commend that kind of empathy towards animals to you. For, by considering the lilies and the birds and beast in such a way, we not only name some of their hurt but we also discover some of their strength. As we contemplate our other-than human brothers and sisters, we begin to find within ourselves the qualities we need to be strengthened. This is part of the gift of God in Creation on which we can draw. So let me conclude in this way and encourage us all to walk in the ways of Jesus and the holy ‘bag lady’, listening and drawing upon the wisdom of God in our fellow creatures. For, in our contemporary world, in the midst of unprecedented ecological challenge:
‘It is a dark time. (so) As deep-diving trout I offer you my fearlessness of the dark...
I, lion, give you my roar, the voice to speak out and be heard..
As rainforest, I offer you my powers to create harmony, enabling many life-forms to live together. Out of this balance and symbiosis new, diverse life can spring...
I am caterpillar. The leaves I eat taste bitter now. But dimly I sense a great change coming. What I offer you, humans, is my willingness to dissolve and transform. I do that without knowing what the end-result will be; so I share with you my courage too.’ Amen.
in the parish of Woy Woy 12 September 2010, by Jonathan Inkpin
Years ago in the east end of London, I once met a remarkable old lady. She was what some call a ‘bag lady’: a homeless woman who carries her possessions with her, perhaps in just a pair of plastic bags. Her story was typical of many homeless people, although also very unique, like those of every homeless person. In this lady’s case, she would tell a very brief biographical tale on a kind of continuous loop, beginning with the words ‘I was a Barnados girl’ which, when she repeated would start her off again on her abbreviated life story. Was she then a sad person lost in a tiny, poor and very vulnerable world, cut off from the rest of us? No, not exactly. For she was in some ways much more in touch with existence than most, if not all of us. For this seeming poor and aged waif had a remarkable quality: the ability to see the plants and animals alive around her, even in the middle of such a busy and environmentally threatening city as London. If you walked along with her for just a minute or two, your eyes and ears would be opened to the animal and plant life you almost always missed: the grass and the sometimes beautiful flowers which pushed through the concrete and the cracks; the birds and the insects and the wildlife which, sometimes incomprehensibly, managed to thrive in the otherwise all-too-human jungle of the city. Almost everyone else was too busy or self-obsessed to ‘consider’ these ‘birds of the air’ and ‘lilies of the field’. It took a similarly over-looked human being to notice and celebrate these astonishing signs of God’s resistance. And, as she drew you into such contemplation and celebration, you thereby discovered the presence of mystery and grace.
Do we hear what the animals and plants, the flora and fauna of our world, have to say to us? I wonder how well we do...
Hands up anyone who has learned something from living with, or observing, a bird, or a plant, or an animal...
...which creatures have ‘spoken’ to you?
Surely all of us have learned something from the animals and plants of our world. For, as a great Christian mystic (Meister Eckhart) once wrote, ‘every creature is a word of God’. Every creature is part of God’s Creation and everyone, even those we do not like very much (the biting and dangerous creatures perhaps), has something to tell us about life and the nature of the one God, that great creative mystery, in which we all share. Isn’t this what Jesus is saying in today’s Gospel, today’s ‘Good News’? Certainly Jesus’ words challenge us to listen more deeply and learn more fully from the other creatures, the flora and fauna, of our world. As we do, like that ‘bag lady’ I mentioned, we are led into a deeper sense of mystery and God’s grace.
Do we look and listen properly however? Do we really appreciate the other sentient creatures around us? Do we glean from them spiritual wisdom, as Jesus did, or do we regard them too much as merely background additions for our use or entertainment? For we live in an age when this contemplative challenge has become ever more important.
‘Listen humans, this is our world too. For hundreds of millions of years we (the other creatures of this world) have been evolving our ways. Long, long before you came into being, these were rich in our own being. Now our days are coming to a close because of what you are doing. It is time for you to hear us.’ (from Joanna Macy ‘World as Lover. World as Self’ p.188 ff)
Those are words from a highly creative learning exercise known as the ‘Council of All Beings’, developed by the Australian environmental campaigner and educator John Seed and the writer and spiritual teacher Joanna Macy. This exercise has been used in many places, not least schools, to try to enable human beings to engage more empathetically with the sufferings as well as the joys of other creatures than ourselves. It is a highly imaginative and fun activity, which can involve the making of colourful masks and costumes, as each human participant takes on the role of a different creature. Gathered in a circle, this ‘Council of All Beings’ then addresses the human race. In turn, each is asked to share what they feel their particular creature might wish to say to us. Here are a few contributions from one particular gathering...
‘Listen humans, I am lichen. I turn rock into soil. I worked as the glaciers retreated, as other life-forms came and went. I thought nothing could stop me...until now. Now I am being poisoned by acid rain...
Listen humans, I am warbler. Your pesticides are in me now. The eggshells are so fragile they break under my weight, break before my young are ready to hatch..
Listen humans, I am raccoon. I speak for the raccoons. See my hand? It is like yours. On soft ground you see its imprint, and know I’ve passed. What marks on this world are you leaving behind?’
Perhaps we can try to imagine what other creatures might say? Think for a moment, for instance, of a bird or animal precious to you – maybe one of the many beautiful but endangered creatures, such as the large forest owls or squirrel gliders of our own Central Coast. What are they feeling and experiencing? What would they say to us if we listened to them?
The reality of course is that our modern world is very unkind and inhospitable to animals in general. Yes, in some ways human beings do love some other creatures quite well, but these are typically a handful of species we have turned into ‘pets’, like dogs and budgies and, to the extent they can be tamed, cats. Other species however do not fare quite so well. Scandalous numbers of birds and animals are needlessly destroyed and abused each year. Unnecessary extinctions of whole species continue to take place as their numbers and habitats are destroyed by human greed and ignorance. Modern so-called ‘civilisation’ exacts a terrible toll, particularly through its human-centred assumptions and technology.
So what does the God have to say on the matter?...
Well, we have heard from our Gospel today that God cares for the humblest bird and flower. When Jesus says ‘consider the lilies of the field’ and how they are clothed by God, or ‘consider the birds of the air’ and how they are fed by God, he is affirming how important they are to God. If human beings may be counted especially important this therefore does not reduce the value of other animals and plants. Rather it challenges us to share with them the same kind of care and compassion which God displays.
What a difference that would make! We must of course be wary of sentimentality at this point. The other-than human world would not be a paradise if human beings were withdrawn from it. Nature in all its guises is not only a place where God may be revealed. It is also ‘red in tooth and claw’, full of brokenness and violence not merely of human making. Anyone who loves cats for instance, must recognise the capacity of other animals to inflict unnecessary pain. At the heart of much understandable atheism or agnosticism is often a similar awareness of the suffering which is an inextricable part of the Creation as a whole. Greater human kindness to animals will not change this. And yet...
The fundamental affirmation of the Bible is that Creation is ‘good’ and that God seeks to bring all things into perfect harmony. For, as we see from the beginning in the book of Genesis, all things are created to be in relationship with one another. The earth and the heavens, the animals and the plants, and, finally, human beings, all are created to live in partnership with one another, not exploitation. One of the deepest expressions of this is found in the book of Isaiah (ch.11 vv.6-9), where the prophet speaks of God’s intent that:
‘the wolf shall live with the lamb, the leopard shall lie down with the kid, the calf and the lion and the fatling together, and a little child shall lead them. The cow and the bear shall graze, their young shall lie down together; and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. The nursing child shall play over the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put its hand on the adder’s den. They will not hurt or destroy on all my holy mountain (says God); and the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.’
Wow! That is truly a ‘new Creation’, isn’t it?!
Indeed it is. For this is part of the messianic promise: the vision of the new Creation which will come about, according to Isaiah, when the Messiah comes. When the Messiah comes, God says, then all the violence in Creation must be ended. This includes the violence suffered and inflicted by animals, as well as the violence humans suffer and inflict on others. The Messianic age may still be ahead of us but it has already begun in Jesus Christ.
So how are we doing with that? Are we living and working towards such a healing of Creation? If so, we might be doing a great deal better in our attitudes and behaviour towards animals, not just the domestic variety. We could be realising afresh that we ourselves are animals and are kith and kin with all other creatures, themselves also valuable in the sight of God. We could be saying ‘no’ to unbridled development and the destruction of eco-systems upon which our fellow sentient creatures depend. We could be reconsidering the amount of meat we eat and the methods of production. We could be dancing with joy like St.Francis at rediscovering our intimate relationship with all the creatures he acknowledged as brother and sister.
‘Consider the lilies of the field.... the birds of the air... the beasts of the field ’ Do we?
I spoke earlier about the imaginative exercise called the ‘Council of All Beings’ and I commend that kind of empathy towards animals to you. For, by considering the lilies and the birds and beast in such a way, we not only name some of their hurt but we also discover some of their strength. As we contemplate our other-than human brothers and sisters, we begin to find within ourselves the qualities we need to be strengthened. This is part of the gift of God in Creation on which we can draw. So let me conclude in this way and encourage us all to walk in the ways of Jesus and the holy ‘bag lady’, listening and drawing upon the wisdom of God in our fellow creatures. For, in our contemporary world, in the midst of unprecedented ecological challenge:
‘It is a dark time. (so) As deep-diving trout I offer you my fearlessness of the dark...
I, lion, give you my roar, the voice to speak out and be heard..
As rainforest, I offer you my powers to create harmony, enabling many life-forms to live together. Out of this balance and symbiosis new, diverse life can spring...
I am caterpillar. The leaves I eat taste bitter now. But dimly I sense a great change coming. What I offer you, humans, is my willingness to dissolve and transform. I do that without knowing what the end-result will be; so I share with you my courage too.’ Amen.
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