Fran Palmeri will provide a Blended Meeting for Learning
Please Join Us in Person or by Zoom – On May 12th at 9:15!
This presentation is part of a celebration of the newly formed alliance of the Annapolis Friends Meeting (AFM) with the Interfaith Partners of the Chesapeake (IPC). On this day we will reconfirm the IPC Congregant [Stewardship] Pledge adopted at AFM earlier this year. The program also marks the beginning of AFM’s fledgling Green Group. With the help and support of the IPC the group will educate ourselves and others about ways we can individually and collectively as a group – take action to care of our planet, its people, and the rich biodiversity that surrounds us and connects all living things with each other. ~ The zoom link is on the AFM calendar. We hope you will join us!
The following reflections and queries are shared by Fran Palmeri. We are pleased and honored she will take these up with us this May 12th at 9: 15. (The Zoom link is on the calendar. We hope you can attend in person or virtually!
MAKING PEACE WITH MOTHER EARTH
By Fran Palmeri
She has sheltered us all our lives. She is the source of our sustenance To the artist she is endless inspiration. To eighteenth century naturalist William Bartram, a Pennsylvania Quaker, the world was endlessly beautiful—“a glorious apartment of the boundless palace of the Sovereign Creator” To the child she is a hundred miracles happening every day.
She is steadfast and unwavering though we war upon her surface. When our government rained thousands of bombs on the city of Baghdad one dark night in 2002, the sun rose the next morning right on schedule. Wars goes on relentlessly globally (Gaza) and locally (in our own backyards where felling trees to build a house goes virtually unnoticed.)
When the Peace Testimony was conceived, the earth was an endless resource to be used at will. After all Genesis gave man dominion over the earth. Over hundreds of years, plants, animals, and whole ecosystems have disappeared due to ignorance, indifference and greed. Wanton destruction is driving thousands of plants and animals to extinction. Can we see ourselves as one of millions of species all connected in the web of life? Can we forgo our notion of hierarchy and accept all creeping crawling things as a part of the peaceable kingdom? Can we coexist with creatures that are not to our liking and accept that there is that of God in everyone and everything?
The Creator inhabits all of the Creation, the dirt beneath our feet, the stars overhead, the depths of the sea as the psalmist declares.
QUERY # 1
What times in your life has the earth helped you, supported you, comforted you?
Can we consider Mother Nature to be THE source, rather than an endless resource to be put to our own uses. Can we move towards sustainability, conservation and restoration? The earth is fragile, in need of care and limited now in what it can do for us. Now it is what we can do for it.
If we are to bring about peace on earth, we must first make peace with the earth.
We must drastically alter our ways of thinking about the earth. Thomas Slaughter the Quaker historian writes in his book on John and William Bartram that killing a “rattler” was a rite of passage for 18th century men. (Not however for William who thought they were “wonderful creatures”) The irrational fear of snakes still compels us to destroy these creatures leading to their extirpation in some areas of our country.
Can we NOT chop down a mature tree and replant a sapling which takes years to grow and uses up precious resources including water before it offers what the mature tree did: energy conservation, traffic calming, cleaning the air, sheltering and feeding plants and animals and beauty? Can we change our thinking from trees are good for property values, to trees are good because they are?
Years ago, New York Yearly Meeting approved the following “Peace with Earth” Minute: “Now we are led to widen our witness again to work for peace between humans and our sacred Earth community. Our culture has considered the Earth our property to be exploited, and we have all, knowingly and unknowingly, been complicit in this violent appropriation of world resources. We must now search for the seeds of this war in our possessions and in our lives and work to nurture a new, mutual relationship with the Earth in all of our actions. The spirit is calling us to hold in reverence this miracle that God has given us. If we are connected to our source, our lives are richer and deeper.”
Can we expand the peace testimony to include the earth? The earth is warming. The seas are rising. What we do or don’t do now is vital to our own survival. If we can think of this beautiful planet as “God’s apartment” then we shall be moving towards peace with Mother Earth.
QUERY #2
The planet is reflecting humanity’s impacts with increasing droughts, fires, storms and floods. How are you called to act on Earth’s behalf?
A flier with more details about the May 12th program is found here. Hoping to see you on the 12th!