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By Katharine Jefferts Schori
Our Book of Common Prayer defines the mission of the Church as “to restore all people to unity with God and each other in Christ” (page 855). If we were to write it today, we would surely also include the ministry of reconciling the rest of God’s creation. Christ’s reconciling ministry is meant for all of creation, and not humanity alone. The existence of human beings is also dependent on God’s providence, just as is that of the birds of the air, and the well-being of all humanity and all creation has something essential to do with how we are or are not reconciling the creation to God.
Our forebears’ fear of Canaanite religion, and later, of other indigenous spiritualities, led to a strong repudiation of the sacred in non-human parts of creation. Other theological strands also often found it difficult to see the image of God even in humanity – those who emphasize our “utter depravity” being a good example. Seeing God’s image in non-human creation has often been wrongly understood to be pantheistic, rather than recalling that root theological principle that all of creation must in some way reflect God and God’s activity.
Creation is not God, but it certainly shows evidence of God’s nature and action. Recall the line in our Eucharistic prayer, “Open our eyes to see your hand at work in the world about us” (BCP, page 372). That legacy of ignoring the activity and presence of the divine in all that is, together with an unfortunate interpretation of the directive in Genesis (1:28) to “have dominion” over creation, have led to the widespread attitude that creation is ours to do with as we please. And some do insist, “surely ‘dominion’ means using the materials of this world in the way that any earthly king might – as personal and private property to be used or abused at will”! Yet the prophetic strand of our tradition has always insisted that those on the margins – the widows, orphans, and aliens – have at least as much claim on the goods of the earth as the “dominion-minded,” and most likely a more urgent and primary claim. Some, both through the ages and in our own time, have heard that prophetic refrain and recognized that non-human creation also has such a claim from below, a clamoring to be heard, fed, cared for, and healed. We often say that the measure of a civilization is how it treats its least able or powerful members. How do we care for the earth, which sustains us through God’s providence?
Reconciliation and restoration, in a theological sense, mean healing or making whole that which is broken, ill, or divided; in other words, recovering the reflection or image of God. Healing becomes possible when a need for it is recognized, and active steps are taken to begin the process, whether we are speaking literally or figuratively about trodden-upon toes. Similarly, until the non-human creation can be recognized, honored, or dignified as the godly product and process it is, we cannot begin to restore or heal our relationship with it – or with God. The attitude that sees only commodity in creation is a violent one. When we look at a forest and see only lumber to be sold to the highest bidder, we have ignored the creatures and creation of God which make up that forest – and we have forgotten that others’ lives, both human and not, ultimately depend in some way upon the health and existence of that forest. Sallie McFague uses the image of the Body of God to speak of the whole creation. How might that image change the way we hear the familiar Pauline language about the Body of Christ – the body that has many members, each essential to its functioning, and each of equal necessity, dignity, and honor?
Violence is the use of force, the use of one’s own strength or life force, to dominate, injure, damage, or kill someone or something. The root of the word violence comes from the Latin violare , to violate, and in turnviolare derives from vis , the force of life, the vital force. Theologically, who or what is that source but God? To exert violence is most fundamentally to use God’s gift of life in a way that deprives another (being, thing) of its own full vis. Another word for it is sin. Yet another is idolatry, that most basic way of turning away from God by putting our own desire or image in the place of God.
What is our attitude, our inclination, our turning toward or away from, the rest of creation? Do we see and affirm that this animal/plant/rock/sea ultimately has its ground of being in the same source as do we? If not, we have already begun in violence.
Perhaps this exercise is easier if we consider our orientation toward other human beings. Human history is replete with demonizations (denying the godliness) of those who are our enemies in war, of those with skin or hair different from our own, of those speak another language or have their roots in other parts of the world. When such a person or people is no longer seen to have much in common with “us” it becomes far easier to treat him or her or them as commodity. The history of slavery is one such example. The treatment of the Japanese (and Italians and others) in this country during World War II is another.
Martin Buber, inI and Thou , reminded us most eloquently that when we can see the reflection of God in another human being, or see that human being as filled with God’s dignity, we become both more human and more divine – we ourselves begin to reflect the image of God. When we do not see or remember that divine mark in another, we have begun to deny even God. Martin Heidegger referred to that commodification of the other as Bestand , literally, the stuff I keep close at hand to use as I will, my “standing reserve.” It can equally characterize our attitudes toward human beings or to the non-human creation.
The violence we express toward the rest of creation is often unwitting. The English people who first settled in Jamestown certainly brought violence to the native inhabitants, but it was not only the violence of physical displacement or superior weaponry. Their blood brought malarial parasites which were unknown here, and as soon as mosquitoes bit enough infected newcomers, the disease was established on this continent. The English brought other germs and parasites as well, to which the Powhatans and other indigenous people were frightfully susceptible. Yet it was probably the colonists’ desire to reproduce their native habitat which eventually wrought the greatest damage. Their farm animals were invaders here too – cows, sheep, pigs, horses, honeybees, chickens – and both their parasites and their escape from captivity brought rapid change to the environment. The colonizers’ method of farming, particularly of tobacco, exhausted the land, changed the character of the forest, and reduced the food supply on which the Powhatan were dependent.
Something quite similar happened in the succeeding centuries as settlers moved west, plowing up the prairie in order to plant monocultures of corn or wheat. The soil’s fertility was lost – even blown away – and the total productivity of the land declined precipitously. The intricate and elegant interconnectedness of the prairie, and its almost mystically diverse and abundant life, was almost totally lost. The slaughter of the buffalo and their replacement with cattle literally removed the abundant subsistence resources on which so many others, human and not, depended.
The gold rush and its successors left scars all over the Western landscape, but not only odd holes and piles of tailings. Topsoil, sparse in the western semi-desert, disappeared. Entire forests were cut for mine timbers and flumes, rivers and lakes rerouted or depleted, and the underlying soils rarely recovered their fertility or productivity. To this day the byproducts of mining continue to pollute and poison earth, air, water, and people.
Yet we cannot only recite the laments. The ongoing presence of God’s activity in creation means that change is a constant, and that healing is possible even when the (apparent) end result looks quite different from what existed before. We cannot return to an Eden like our forebears knew. But we can, as co-creators with God, participate in a holier use of, and relationship with, the rest of creation.
Reconciling, restoring, or healing creation begins with addressing the rest of creation with the awe and wonder that can see within it the vis , the God-given source of its being. That approach is fundamentally non-violent; it does not seek to extinguish the reflection of the divine so that my needs or desires may be met, above all others. Acknowledging the hand of God at work in creation is the beginning. It must be followed with respectful and appropriate interaction, an attitude toward use that says, “how can my work here, myministry , be a source of greater and more abundant life?” How can my daily use of water bless the rest of creation? How can the way in which I seek to satisfy my basic needs, whether food, power, or clothing, serve God, neighbor, and the greater good? How can my community help to heal the ravages that we (human communities) have wrought upon the “other” – that part of creation that has no voice but ours?
The Most Rev. Katharine Jefferts-Schori is the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church.
An excerpted version of this article appears in the Religion and Violence issue of Trinity News.
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