Ash Wednesday in the Anthropocene

For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us,
Accept our repentance, Lord.
(Litany of Penitence, Book of Common Prayer, p. 268)

Ash Wednesday marks the beginning of Lent, a season of penitence in preparation for Easter. Among the sins for which we repent is the sin of wasting and polluting God’s creation, a result of the sin of “lack of concern for those who come after us”. It’s a failure of love for the people of the next generation and the one after that, a failure to love our children and grandchildren enough to change the way we produce and use energy.

The ashes on our foreheads are a sign of our penitence and our mortality. As the ashes are imposed on our foreheads, we hear “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” We are mortal, created from “dust”, the fundamental stuff of the universe. Religious people perhaps more than others are tempted to forget this from time to time. When we recite the Apostles’ Creed, we say we believe in the resurrection of the body, but we Christians often speak as if we believe in the Platonic idea of the immortality of the soul instead. Reacting to a culture that tempts us to see ourselves as bodies without souls — the root of many sins — we sometimes overcorrect and begin to think of ourselves as souls without bodies. Forgetting our embodiment, forgetting that we are made of dust, can also be the root of sins.

The dualism resulting from thinking of our souls and bodies as independent of one another is one source of our failure to care enough about God’s creation. We talk about loving God and loving one another, but somehow think we can do that by being nice people who don’t want to think about the ongoing destruction of the biosphere since the concrete world around us isn't "spiritual".

If you’ve been following the national political conversation leading up to the presidential election, it seems the risk climate change poses to human life is not on most people’s — or at least most politicians’ and commentators’ — lists of most important issues. The destruction of the biosphere is treated at best as some sort of side issue. It is amazing that the biggest threat ever faced by humanity is given only glancing mention at best, and is still downright denied by some.

Pondering our own mortality as individuals can be difficult intellectually, emotionally, and spiritually, but we recognize that coming to accept our mortality is necessary to our growth as mature Christians. Pondering the mortality of our species, and pondering it not in some distant age, is much, much more difficult, but equally necessary for Christians in this century to think about and pray about.

Phil Torres is a philosopher and the author of the book The End: What Science and Religion Tell Us About the Apocalypse. The book will be released in a week. From some of the reviews available, it sounds like Torres pits science / reason / observation against religion / faith / revelation (a different dualism from the soul / body split) and indicates that religious eschatology puts us in danger of not responding adequately to the very real risks to the survival of humanity we face in this century. Given this negative take on religion, it’s perhaps ironic that an article by Phil Torres published today on the Common Dreams sight gave me a deeper understanding this Ash Wednesday of the importance of pausing to think about and pray about our own personal mortality and the mortality of our species. Our survival might depend on our remembering our mortality, on our remembering that we are dust.

In Biodiversity Loss and the Doomsday Clock: An Invisible Disaster Almost No One is Talking About, Torres outlines some of the risks we face as a result of climate change and related forms of environmental degradation, and then notes:

We must, moving forward, never forget that just as we’re minds embodied, so too are we bodies environed, meaning that if the environment implodes under the weight of civilization, then civilization itself is doomed. 

Ash Wednesday brings us back to the reality of our embodiment. An adequate look at our own mortality this century must include embracing the reality of our environment.

Remember that you are dust.
Remember that we are connected to one another and to everything else on our planet.

Ash Wednesday: Speaking the Uncomfortable Words

"Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”

On Ash Wednesday, many of us go out of our way to get to church so we can hear or say these words that declare our mortality. They are not comforting words, but they are honest words. They tell the truth we all know but seldom articulate. We know that the way to a deeper appreciation of the wonder and joy of Easter resurrection begins with this clear reminder of the way things are: we are mortal, made of dust, and utterly dependent on God for life now and after the death of our present bodies. 

The passage we read on Ash Wednesday from Isaiah (Isaiah 58:1-12) might also make us a bit uncomfortable. God says that the sort of fast that God chooses isn’t a traditional fast; it isn’t practicing false humility, but it’s doing something bold: loosing the bonds of injustice, freeing the oppressed, feeding and clothing the hungry and giving them shelter. 

Different people take different paths for Lenten discipline. Different stages of life and especially different stages of the faith journey call for different practices. Anything that helps us repent of “our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us” (Book of Common Prayer, p. 268) is appropriate for a Lenten discipline, and especially so as the gap between what climate scientists expect us to experience this century and what we are doing to either mitigate that or prepare for it seems to grow greater every year. 

Once again this year, the Massachusetts Conference of the United Church of Christ offers the option of a “carbon fast”, a calendar with a different action each day to help us become more conscious of our energy use and more conscientious about our stewardship.  Another option is a simple practice of spending some time outdoors every day just looking and listening and reconnecting to God through reconnecting with God’s creation. [See Lent in God’s Holy Creation]

Another practice to consider adopting this Lent resonates with the truthful but sometimes uncomfortable words of Ash Wednesday: we could simply speak out loud about climate change. People are uncomfortable talking about climate change. After all, we are uncomfortable talking about our own mortality, and if climate change continues under the “business as usual” scenario that seems to be all our political and business leaders can muster, we are talking about ecocide, about the death of the biosphere that supports and sustains all living things on our planet. Speaking the truth — just saying the words — requires some boldness and courage in most settings. There is an unwritten, unspoken, assumption that climate change, like death, is not something to acknowledge in polite company. It doesn’t need to be argumentative or in people’s faces; it is often enough to say, “I’m concerned about climate change.”

In a completely secular setting, Bill Nye (the Science Guy) recently talked about climate change on MSNBC and asked that television journalists “just say ‘climate change’”. In this clip, you hear him say, “People ask me all the time ‘What can I do about climate change?’ Just talk about it. If we were talking about it, we would raise awareness and we would get to work.”

There is even more reason for Christians to talk about climate change. Just as we must take an honest look at our personal mortality in order to appreciate God’s gift of life both now and eternally, we must take an honest look at climate change in order to realize the precarious and precious nature of our biosphere. We must take an honest look at climate change in order to be grounded in the truth that can give us the sense of urgency to act boldly to keep the worst possible scenarios from unfolding. The Hebrew prophets knew that the work of God’s people was the work of the restoration or repair of a just and beautiful creation. The work of the church in this century must include the work of talking about climate change and advocating for climate stability. If we neglect this work at this critical point of human history, and if we neglect our brothers and sisters who already suffer displacement, hunger, or increased poverty and violence because of the effects of climate change, our fast days and our claims to be praying to God in humility are meaningless. 

Ash Wednesday Repentance

For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us,

Accept our repentance, Lord.

Our confession of waste and pollution of creation and of our lack of concern for future generations bears on environmental stewardship more obviously than do other parts of the Litany of Penitence. A closer examination and reflection on our Ash Wednesday prayers, however, reveal many links between the faults we confess and the way we do -- or do not -- care for the earth.

Confession of our self-indulgence, exploitation of other people, an intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts, and our blindness to human needs and suffering are intertwined with the way we care for the environment. In particular, environmental degradation often affects people living in poverty to a greater degree than it affects wealthier people.

On April 21, the Episcopal Church will sponsor an ecumenical forum on the topic of The Intersection of Poverty and the Environment. The forum, which will be webcast at 11:00 Central time, will feature Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori. For now, the fact that the church is highlighting the relationship between poverty and environmental degradation provides a starting place for reflection during Lent.

Today’s text from Isaiah (Isaiah 58:1-12) says that a true fast, a day truly acceptable to the Lord, consists of acts of mercy and justice. When we do these things, says Isaiah, we will find ourselves strengthened and guided by God. The passage ends with the statement that those who meet the needs of others and relieve suffering will “be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in”. We cannot repair and restore the world so that everyone has adequate food and water and health unless we greatly reduce pollution and address climate change. In a complex world, habits and actions that seem innocent and harmless to us might very well be causing hardship for people somewhere else. Part of following Jesus is learning more about our world, more about the sources of pollution and climate change and their effects, so that we can be certain it is Jesus we are following.

God of the desert, as we follow Jesus into the unknown,

may we recognize the tempter when he comes;

let it be your bread we eat,

your world we serve and you alone we worship.

(From the Collects for Ash Wednesday in A New Zealand Prayer Book , p. 573.)

Ash Wednesday

For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us,

Accept our repentance, Lord.

Recently a relatively new acquaintance in the diocese told me that when he first met me and heard me talk about my ministry, he didn’t understand why anyone would do environmental ministry; for him it didn’t seem to fit the model of other ministries of the church. But he then said that after hearing me talk about creation care, he had begun to notice how often we pray for the earth and its resources, for God’s creation, and realized that concern for creation is found throughout our liturgy. I thought about this conversation after our midday Ash Wednesday service because repentance for our poor stewardship of the environment and for our lack of concern about that poor stewardship is spelled out clearly in these lines from the Litany of Penitence.

In fact, many of the sins we confess in the Litany of Penitence are directly related to issues of environmental stewardship: self-indulgence, exploitation of other people, an intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts, and our blindness to human needs and suffering (including the suffering of people whose health is affected by air and water pollution or climate change). As we pray this litany on Ash Wednesday, it’s easy to read the words and move on to the next part of the litany without connecting what we are saying to any particular actions or situations; it’s easy to be sincere about our penitence on an abstract level without connecting that penitence to areas where we could and should make changes in our own lives. It might be good to find some quiet time early on during Lent to pray through the Litany of Penitence (pp. 267-269 in the Book of Common Prayer) slowly, taking the time to think more specifically about where we have fallen short so that we can truly repent and turn toward better ways of living our lives.

Today’s lectionary text from Isaiah (Isaiah 58:1-12) says that a true fast, a day truly acceptable to the Lord, consists of acts of mercy and justice. When we do these things, says Isaiah, we will find ourselves strengthened and guided by God. The passage ends with the statement that those who meet the needs of others and relieve suffering will “be called the repairer of the breach, the restorer of streets to live in”. Pollution and climate change are leaving many places where people live in need of restoration. God has work for us to do when we get up off our knees.

Litany of Penitence

For our waste and pollution of your creation, and our lack of concern for those who come after us,
Accept our repentance, Lord.

(From the Ash Wednesday Litany of Penitence, The Book of Common Prayer, p. 268)

Episcopalians began Lent yesterday with our liturgy for Ash Wednesday. This liturgy calls us to a holy Lent; we begin that holy Lent by receiving ashes that remind us that God created us out of the dust of the Earth, that we are mortals, and that it is through Christ that we have the gift of everlasting life. The reminder that we are of the Earth -- that we are human, created from humus – brings us to humility, opening our hearts for the Litany of Penitence, an extended form of confession that names particular areas of our lives in which we have sinned by what we have done and by what we have left undone.

This group confession, acknowledging our sins personally and corporately, is very moving. As we prayed through this liturgy at St. Stephen’s yesterday evening, I was especially struck by our acknowledgment of our waste and pollution of creation. This part of the litany includes an acknowledgement of our lack of concern for future generations; we often say we care about those who will come after us, but if we do little to care for our planet, our words are hollow and meaningless.

Besides this section of the litany itself, though, I was also struck by the interconnection among all of the sections of the litany. Jesus taught that all the commandments can be summarized by the commandments to love God and love our neighbors, and all of the particular parts of the litany of penitence are connected to our confession of our failure to love God with our whole heart, and mind, and strength, and our neighbors as ourselves.

Our disregard for creation is a disregard for God’s work, God’s holy creation, and a disregard for other people. It’s directly connected to other sins that we confess in the litany: our “self-indulgent appetites and ways” and the accompanying “exploitation of other people”; our “intemperate love of worldly goods and comforts”, our “blindness to human need and suffering”.

In preparation for the Sustainable Faith forum  planned for February 27 at the College of Saint Mary in Omaha, I’ve been thinking about “greening” congregations. This is a catchall phrase for any sort of efforts at being better stewards of the environment. It can range through several levels of commitment. A downward nudge of the thermostat or a decision to get the mugs out of the kitchen cupboard and quit using Styrofoam cups at coffee hour is a beginning. There are several levels of commitment to looking at and addressing energy usage, paper usage, cleaning supplies, lawn care and water usage, and all the other things we are learning to consider in our homes, schools, and businesses in an effort to take better care of the Earth. At the deepest level, we realize that being truly “green”, being deeply committed to caring for creation, is connected to all the other areas of our lives that are addressed in the litany of penitence.

What will be the fruits of our penitent and renewed spirits at the end of this Lenten season? The depth of our intention to be more constant in our love of God and of our neighbors will be reflected by the depth of our commitment to care for God’s creation, and by our efforts to leave a sustainable environment for those who come after us.