Mtr Kelli Joyce

The nations raged,
but your wrath has come,
and the time for judging the dead,
for rewarding your servants, the prophets
and saints and all who fear your name,
both small and great,
and for destroying those who destroy the earth.

Dear Friends in Christ,

At Diocesan Convention the weekend before last, we devoted a great deal of our time to reflecting on what it means for us to be faithful stewards of the world God has created. We discussed various approaches that parish communities and the people in them can act to mitigate and respond to the reality of a climate that is rapidly changing because of the carbon added to our atmosphere by industrial production and transportation systems built around the combustion engine. We talked about water scarcity, which is a topic of particular concern for us here in the desert. (I haven't lived in Arizona for as long as many of you, but the last two monsoon seasons have seemed remarkably dry to me.)

We also talked about how it isn't always made clear what these topics have to do with the Church. Some people's instinctive response is that this is a political matter, and so the Church should stay out of it. But in today's reading from the Revelation to John, the warning is clear and dire: those who destroy the earth will face the wrath of Almighty God.

The world belongs to God, who made it - we are called to steward it, which means protecting it and doing what we can to help it flourish. And that flourishing involves looking to the well-being of the plants and animals that God chose to make, and put in their habitats, and sustains with sun and rain and air each day. Stewarding what belongs to God means we cannot condone the destruction of God's creation for the sake of our own comfort or convenience.

Psalm 24 begins with this verse: "The earth is the Lord's and all that is in it, the world and all who dwell therein." Whatever rights we may have to property under human laws are, for us Christians, fully subject to the knowledge that actually, everything we have and control belongs to God, and we are commanded to make use of them in accordance with God's generous, loving, life-giving will - not in accordance with our self-interest.

I don't know how you might be able to adjust your consumption of energy and material goods to participate less in the ongoing destruction of God's creation. But I hope you will join me in asking the question.

In peace,
Mtr Kelli