Earth Day 2017

By Anne A. Simpkinson

Posted on 4/20/2017

Forty-seven years ago, the first Earth Day brought together 20 million Americans; this year on April 22, a billion people across the globe will celebrate our planet in nearly 195 countries. And while attention will be rightfully focused on environmental literacy and education, Earth Day is not only about the science of a healthy planet but our sacred relationship with the natural world, our home.

At a recent conference, Winona LaDuke, executive director of Honor the Earth, spoke about our responsibility to the place we live. “It is really time to recover the names, recover the places, recover the relationship, recover the time, and recover the love of the ecosystem that we have come to be in,” she said.

We here at Mercy by the Sea encourage and support building relationships with the natural environment — be it flora or fauna, sky or sea, wind or winged ones. One aspect of our commitment to deepening a connection and commitment to this land is the palpable sense of respect and honor that the staff, volunteers, presenters and spiritual directors, who work or give programs here, convey. That respect and honor ranges from the loving care that our volunteer gardeners pour into our flower and vegetable gardens and the grounds to our recycling efforts, and from the staff’s delight and appreciation of the fox, groundhogs, chipmunks, birds and trees to the kitchen's commitment to serving locally grown and organic food as much as possible.

It is also found in our programming. For example, we have two upcoming programs on April 29—Mindfully Living on the Earth and with Each Other and As One: A Day in Creation, the Garden and the Creator—that approach eco-consciousness in different ways. And another program on May 11 and June 8—Into the Peace of Wild Things: Exploring the Spring Nature of Our Common Home—combines a contemplative walk in the woods with the sharing of knowledge about what is found there.

Celebrating and mobilizing on Earth Day each year is a critical and urgent response to ecological changes occurring across the globe. But, perhaps our goal should be to live into Earth Day every day. For as Chief Seattle said, “Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together…all things connect.” Amen.