Our Pets, Our Earth
/by Rev. Eric Folkerth
What if we treated the Earth the way we treat our pets?
I know, it’s a strange question, but bear with me…
We’ll celebrate Earth Day during “Church on the Lawn” this Sunday (April 25, 11 am). Our KPUMC member, Kelly Longfellow, will present some of her wisdom about our own Christian tradition and its call for us to care for the Earth. (She’s been doing graduate level research on this subject the past few years…)
We’ll also offer a “Blessing of the Animals” for you all. Bring your pets with you —literally, any pet is fine, so long as you can control it— and our staff will offer a blessing for you and your pet.
Our pets are a crucial part of our families, aren’t they?
They walk this journey of life with us, and they give endless joy and love to us. For example, our dog Daisy is there for the good and the bad. When times are difficult, she comes and lays at our feet. She coaxes us out of our depression and calls us to “play.”
And in response, we care for her.
And you care for *your* pets too. You shower them with love and affection.
What if we did the same for the Earth?
Christian theology has been both a help and a hindrance to the cause of caring for God’s good created Earth. Negatively, the Creation Myth itself has often been twisted beyond recognition. In Genesis Chapter 1, when God gives human beings the Garden of Eden, God tells them they can “subdue” it. But in Chapter 2, God uses different language, and invites them to “cultivate and keep it.”
Far too many Christians have heard the first command and totally failed to hear the second. They have used Christianity —and this one word, “subdue”— as a theological justification, and weapon, for the Earth’s destruction and degradation. My theology professor, John Holbert suggests, btw, that reading the word as “subdue” is a MIS-reading. It actually means more like “be a steward of” the Earth.
But however we read this first command, it’s very clear we are not living up to the second…the command to “cultivate and keep” the Earth. The word “cultivate” has the meaning of “be a slave to.” In other words, this was never intended to be a “lording over,” or “above” creation. God’s command was intended to be an inviting to live *with* the created world.
But, somehow, the human animal has thrown Earth’s natural processes into chaos.
What’s the path back?
That gets me back to our pets, and the image I’d like to place in your heads: Treat the whole of Earth the way you treat your pets.
We love and care for them. And *they* are part of God’s creation. So, what if we simply extended out that love and care —beyond the walls of our own homes— and to the world itself?
We preachers use this same dynamic with human children all the time. We say to parents: “Treat all human beings you meet as if they were your own children.”
It’s a way of inviting us all to see the “Other” as actually a part of our family. Which is, of course, what God wants us to do.
I’m saying: just do that same thing, but with your pets. Love God’s good Earth with the love and care that you love your pets.
As you would your beloved pets, give the Earth clean water, food, and nourishment.
Allow the Earth the chance to rest.
When the Earth is sick, ask how you can help it heal, and then do that.
Play with the Earth, but do not dominate it.
Live in harmony with Earth as if it’s a part of your family, not above or separate from it.
That most dangerous fiction we Christians ever believed is that we can live above or separate from Earth itself, lording over it like lesser gods.
Our destiny is, in fact, deeply interconnected with the life and legacy of all creation. If Earth thrives, we do. If Earth dies, we do too.
The key to this —as it is to almost everything good— is compassion. See the Earth not as an “other” or as a problem to be overcome, but as a part of your family, and your life.
Because it is.