Earth Day Worship

This year, in honour of Earth Day, we started an hour early with some activities including garbage clean-up, letter writing, forest bingo (for the kids!) and a self-guided spring ephemeral walk.

As we moved into a time of worship, we focused on celebrating the ways we are cared for by the Earth, rather than on the problems we need to fix. The Earth is amazing, and full of blessings!

These two verses came to mind:
"The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it."  - Psalm 24:1
"Do to others as you would have them do to you."  - Luke 6:31

The last chapter of Barbara Brown Taylor's book An Altar in the World is called “The Practice of Pronouncing Blessings.” She writes, 
“To pronounce a blessing on something is to see it from the divine perspective. To pronounce a blessing is to participate in God's own initiative. To pronounce a blessing is to share God's own audacity.”
“The key to blessing things is knowing that they beat you to it. They key to blessing things is to receive their blessing.”

We wandered with these invitations:
Remember that we are both blessed by the earth, and we are a blessing to the earth. 
See what captures your attention, stop, and offer a blessing.
Consider how it has first blessed you.
Rather than continuing on and jumping to bless and be blessed by as many beings as possible, take time to listen and offer the gift of your attention and time.
What do they want you to know?
What do they have to tell you about God?
​What does God want you to know about them?