INTERDEPENDENCE: REALIZING OUR SEVENTH PRINCIPLE

The Rev. Mark Ward
Unitarian Universalist Church of Asheville

Asheville, NC

April 22, 2007

RITUAL OF PLANTING

(Student minister Sally Beth Shore assisted in the section)

READINGS

(Mark)
We are here to abet creation and to witness to it. To notice each other’s beautiful face and complex nature so that creation need not play to an empty house.
Annie Dillard

(Sally Beth)
This we know. The earth does not belong to us; we belong to the earth. All things are connected. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons and daughters of the earth. We did not weave the web of life; we are merely a strand in it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves.
Attributed to Chief Seattle

(Mark)
I am at home in the universe. The forests are the rooms of the house of my childhood. The winds are my mother’s arms. The sun is my child’s laughter. The caterpillar crawling on my hand is my brother’s arm thrown over my shoulder. The earth is my home and its creatures are my family. There is no loneliness to overtake me. I live warm and friendly with my fellows in the starry world.
Kenneth Patton

(Sally Beth)
I am only one, but still I am one.
I cannot do everything, but still I can do something.
And because I cannot do everything
I will not refuse to do the something that I can do.
Edward Everett Hale

Ritual

(Mark)
In our Seventh Principle, we affirm that as human beings we are connected at the deepest levels with all life. From the smallest microbe to the largest whale, the tallest redwood, life in all its wonderful variety and complexity is knit together in the deepest ways.

(Sally Beth)
To say that we and all forms of life are interdependent is to say that we do more than share the same time and space. We depend on each other for our flourishing and survival. None of us is alone. We are all part of the web of life.

(Mark)
This is a truth that we humans have been slow to learn. We have ruined rivers and lakes, poisoned the air and scarred the Earth. By our actions, whole species of plants and animals are vanishing and we are disrupting the very conditions that make life possible. Our own survival may soon be at stake.

(Sally Beth)
Yet, even as we have been agents of destruction, we can also be agents of healing and renewal. We can stop those practices that destroy life and join together in actions that repair and support the web of life. Our planting ritual today symbolizes our commitment as Unitarian Universalists to take our places as stewards of the Earth.

(Mark, holding up a potted plant)
Behold, life: tender and green, yet pushing, striving, enriching the Earth, one strand of a web that, stretching across untold millennia, links all living things to each of us.

(Sally Beth, holding up a container of soil)
Behold, earth: the firmament, ground of all life, that to which all living things return, solid, substantial, source of life’s nutrients.

(Mark, holding up a container of water)
Behold, water: Origin of life, universal solvent, trickling, flowing across and through all things, life’s essential need.

(Sally Beth, holding up arms)
Behold, air: Surrounding us, blowing across our faces, carrying the clouds. Breathe in and feel it fill your lungs, breathe out and feel your body relax. Breathe in the peace that comes from being at home on Earth; breathe out any feelings of isolation or fear.

(Mark)
From the time of its origin some three billion years ago, life on Earth relied on these simple ingredients to survive. And life has evolved to a level of diversity never seen before, with bees and bison, sharks and sea gulls, corals and cougars, pines and poinsettias, huckleberries and humans.

(Sally Beth)
We have come to take for granted that fertile soil, pure water and clean air will always be available, yet because of our carelessness we have poisoned the earth, the water and the air. We can no long take them and the diversity of life they support for granted.

(Mark)
As people who respect and celebrate the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part, it is our duty to act as stewards of the Earth and the living things it supports. To symbolize our commitment, we use this soil and this water to nourish this plant as we place it in this pot. After this service we will put this plant in a garden of this church, and we welcome you to take a plant from a table as you leave to place in a pot or garden in your home as a symbol of your commitment to act as a steward of the Earth.

REFLECTIONS

There was a moment during that freak freeze a couple of weeks ago when temperatures as low as the teens killed the first growth of many plants that I got what felt like an eerie view of a possible future. Looking at that first fresh growth turned brown and limp, I thought about the many ecological threats that we face these days, and I realized how much I take for granted about the world around me.

I have grown used to the sight of these mountains with their rich diversity of plant and animal life, and I have grown used to the gentle climate that supports it all. We wake up every day ready to greet the morning in this wonderful place, expecting it to be what has always been, and yet we know that some things are changing. Our weather is getting whacky, and some plants and animals we used to find around here are disappearing. Many of these changes are gradual, so we don’t notice them right away. The early freezes, hurricanes and the like feel like freak events. And yet scientists tell us that many of them are part of a larger change that is happening on a planetary scale. They are telling us that the climate world-wide is warming and that human activity, our activity, is driving it.

Many of you have seen Al Gore’s movie, “An Inconvenient Truth,” which made the case for human impact on global warming. About a month ago a dozen clergy from churches in the Asheville area gathered here in Sandburg Hall to hear William Schlesinger, an environmental scientist at Duke University, discuss the impact of warming in North Carolina.

If current trends continue, he said, by 2020 to 2030 average temperatures in North Carolina will rise 2 to 4 degrees centigrade, making the average climate here like that of Jacksonville or Orlando, Florida today. By 2050 the climate in the Southeast will be much drier, while rising sea levels from melting of polar ice this century may flood the Outer Banks and profoundly disrupt eastern fisheries. And these are only the broad trends. We can’t really predict all the local changes.

You have heard much of this before, I’m sure, and it’s all a little overwhelming and, honestly, a little scary. It’s easy to get into a habit of thinking that there’s nothing we can do about it. But I have something to tell you that I hope might make you feel better. Beneath the brown dead leaves on the trees in our yard that were killed by the frost the buds are swelling again. The trees still look sad and scraggly, but they are not defeated. They’re getting ready to send out new leaves to replace the ones they lost. They’re not giving up, and neither should we.

The scientists who have been studying global warming are telling us that, while we can’t avoid some warming of our climate – the pollution we have pumped into the atmosphere is there and we can’t change that – anything we do to at least slow the warming will make a difference.

We can reduce the disruption of life if we act now. And if we are to be successful we need leadership from far-sighted people who understand that all living things are part of an interdependent web in which we each have a stake, to which we each have a duty.

Thirty-seven years ago this day in April was designated as Earth Day, a moment for us as human beings to acknowledge our dependence on and duty to the earth. And so it is appropriate that this is the day that I conclude my year-long series on our Unitarian Universalist principles by inviting us to honor and celebrate the seventh principle: We covenant to affirm and promote respect for the interdependent web of existence of which we are a part.

The seventh principle is the newest and in some ways the most radical of them all, one that in many ways we are still struggling to embrace. That struggle began when changes in our purposes and principles were proposed in 1984. The original seventh principle called for us to “respect for the integrity of the earth and its resources.” But a number of people objected to that language. They said that while it honored the Earth it continued to treat us humans as separate from the rest of the natural world. It called us to respect the Earth in a way that seemed to make us observers, not beings bound up with the rest of all life. It was during General Assembly that the wording we know now was introduced, wording that included us in the circle of all life and affirmed that we depend on it, as it depends on us.

As far as I can tell, no other religious body makes such a statement. Other religious traditions speak of care for and love of the natural world, but none other affirms that we as humans are a part of it. We did not rise up separate or somehow privileged; we are bound up with everything, and we owe a duty to the interconnected web of all life.

It is bold language, but it has taken awhile for us to reflect on what it means for us as religious people. I’ve heard people joke that it means we believe in recycling. But really it touches on something much deeper.

My advisor in seminary, the Rev. David Bumbaugh, has suggested that we as Unitarian Universalists could find the heart of our faith for the 21st century in the seventh principle. The seventh principle is special, he says, because, in his words, it “calls us to reverence before the world, not some future world, but this miraculous world of our everyday experience.”

The seventh principle describes a way of looking at the world where “everything matters” because all things are connected. Nothing we do is in isolation; everything affects the larger world. The world does not exist for us to do with it what we choose; we are responsible to it. And at the center of our concern is life itself, this amazing process that we still hardly understand, evolving, renewing, creating. In this way of looking at the world, that which we consider holy or sacred, the most precious thing, is not far off. It is present to us in every moment.

What this means is that wherever we are, we are at home. Because we are all linked with each other, any damage we inflict on others we ultimately inflict on ourselves. All things are one thing. What is needed of us is that we give up any notion that we can or should control the world, but that we look for ways to work in tune with life, with humility, compassion and respect.

We are still learning what it means to live in a way that truly respects the interdependent web of existence, but one thing we do know is that it means we should halt the disruption of life that we as humans are responsible for. We don’t know everything that is responsible for that disruption of life, but we do know a few things. We know that the way we burn fuels for energy to make everything run is poisoning the air, water and land, and helping to change our climate. We know that if we could burn less energy or use sources of energy that don’t pollute, or at least don’t pollute as much we could make a difference.

Today as a way of calling attention to this we asked you to try to find ways to get to church that reduced the amount of driving that you usually do: walk, bike, share a ride. We could be doing more of this. There are many imaginative ways of thinking about our energy use. What if here at church and each of us at home kept track of our power and heating bills and pledged to reduce our energy use by a certain percentage? We could trade ideas on saving energy and make a difference right here.

A little later you’ll be hearing about our efforts to make this church a Green Sanctuary, a place that encourages practices that protect and sustain the environment. We have done much already, and with your help we’ll do even more. Our challenge will be to make this work more than a one-day wonder: celebrating Earth Day and then leaving it at that and going back to the comforts of our cars and homes without making any changes.

As I said earlier, the idea of trying to stop global climate change can feel overwhelming. It feels like too big a problem for us to solve. And it’s true that none of us can change it by ourselves. All we can do is to do what we can. My friend and colleague, the Rev. Jim McKinley, minister of the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Hendersonville, tells of sitting with his daughter one night in that quiet, special time before bed after they had seen TV programs on global warming and climate change. He says his daughter asked him, “Dad, will the earth keep working until after I die? I want to get to be old, and I really want to have children too.”

Somehow, he said, it didn’t seem like enough to say, “I hope so,” and “I hope you do and can.” Instead what he thought, and what he thinks he may have said is, “I will do my part to help give you those chances.”

I think Jim is right. We have no choice, and just saying we hope things will get better is not enough. We must each do our part to give the chance to those we love and the generations ahead of them to live and grow on this beautiful planet. It will take a while to figure out the best ways of doing that, but to find those ways we must begin by doing what we can. And we must use the wisdom of our seventh principle to teach us that we will need encouragement and support from each other to do it.

And, finally, it will be joy, not fear, that inspires our work because it will come out of our recognition that in serving life we are serving each other and in the end the best hope we have.

So Be It.