Walking together for Creation Time

The Orthodox Church year begins in September.  The first month, until the feast of Francis, patron of all things ecology, is dedicated to creation.  It is especially important to remember Creation Time this year as the worlds’ leaders prepare to meet in Paris in November for the 21st attempt to make a universal climate agreement.  The aim of the conference is to achieve a new international agreement on the climate, applicable to all countries, with the aim of keeping the global temperature rise below 2°C.  We’ve been here before and come away empty handed.  This really is the issue of our time.  The effects of even 2°C warming will be world changing.  The current migration crisis will pale into insignificance when sea levels rise enough to cause whole countries to be uninhabitable.  Not only will those who suffer unrest or terror be forced to become migrants, many more will end up as guest in foreign lands.  The gospel readings throughout September this year speak of Jesus journeying in the company of his disciples encountering all kinds of people in need.  This week we hear Jesus challenged by a woman who turns his words back onto him.  We hear of a deaf man with a speech impediment brought to him.  The journey for Jesus was not without confrontation.  Neither will our journey if we are willing to take off our shoes and feel the cry of the earth beneath our feet and of those who dwell on it.  To take off ones shoes is to unbuckle ones minds of normal thinking, to un-stopper our ears to the cry of those in pain and to open our mouths both in protest and with words of healing.  This is to begin to see the world through the eyes of Jesus.
As we contemplate beginning a shared journey with each other and with the earth.