[Note: Today’s guest blogger is Mary Ann Schifitto. Mary Ann says, “I am an immigrant in this country and raised by immigrant parents in another country. I am married to an immigrant. I am a mom and a grandmother. I place a great deal of importance on education as my working career was as a teacher. I place great importance on making our Earth healthy for now and the future. I am co-leader of the Mother Earth Ministry. How can we bring forth our talents to bring about change?” Thank you, Mary Ann!]
This is the time of Lent.
In the words of the Archbishop of Canterbury, “Lent is a season of return. Return to Christ, who knows our weakness. Return to Christ, who meets us with mercy. Return to Christ, who leads us towards hope. In a world that can feel anxious and divided, this season offers something steady.” Let’s keep this in mind as we reflect upon this reading from Isaiah 49:8-15
“The Lord has a covenant with us to restore the land. The Lord comforts the people. The Lord shows compassion and shows mercy to the afflicted. “
We hear these words and others in this reading.
But how will the Lord restore the land? And we might ask ourselves, “What do these words say to me?”
Upon reading other reflections and rereading my own blog (which I wrote a couple of years ago for Lent) I realized out of the many readings that I could have chosen, this reading from Isaiah 49 struck me once again. My voice in the previous blog was more light, more hopeful. This time around I feel more of a darkness surrounding us, almost insurmountable, of all the climate related calamities that are occurring.
Sounding doom and gloom? It’s so easy to go there.
Stay with me, it’s not all doom and gloom. I believe that this is what God is showing us through his mercy.
Just the other day a sense of disappointment and helplessness surrounded me when I was reading in the news that the Environmental Protection Agency would rescind the scientific Endangerment Finding that says greenhouse gases threaten human life and well being. Consequently this action is on its way to removing limits on carbon dioxide, methane and other greenhouse gases that are bringing about more pollution, heat waves, wildfires etc.
I have been here before, dealing with these feelings, and I have actively transformed myself into a better frame of mind to help save our environment. But this news is definitely a blow.
How are we going to stop the harm this will cause?
There is a real sense of abandonment. “The Lord has forsaken me; my Lord has forgotten me.” These were the phrases that stood out to me in the news surrounding me. But God tells us that despite these feelings of abandonment God has not forgotten us. God will lead us to springs of water when we are thirsty. God says, “I will not forget you.”
But something happened on the same day of this news, just by chance. I was listening to a webinar by Plastic Pollution Coalition on the topic of using plastics. One speaker in particular grabbed my attention. She spoke of a group of volunteers who worked with schools in New York City to eliminate styrofoam trays that were used for children lunches in school cafeterias. Their grassroot efforts called Plastic Free Lunch, was successful and as a result styrofoam trays are no longer used in school cafeterias. The speaker continued to communicate how that one action led to the elimination of styrofoam use in New York State, with some exceptions.
Gloom turned into excitement and relief. Despair turned into action. I was filled with excitement and shown the way, once again, to be stewards of the Earth. We are called to be stewards and protectors of God’s creation. In other words, even though some regulations seem disastrous, we must trust that other avenues will open up as a result of cooperative action, bit by bit, to bring about change.
We are told that God will restore the land and that God is calling us to trust that God will show compassion when we are suffering. My take away of these two reactions I had the same day to two vastly different communications regarding climate change, is that the Lord is with us, guiding us to turn despair into action and to trust and pray to the Lord.
I encourage all of us to ask God to help us use our talents and whatever time we can spare to keep forging ahead and to trust we can bring about positive change to help heal our Mother Earth.
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