Tag: Biodiveristy

Blessings for Creation

28th September 2024

(You may wish to adapt these prayers to suit your local green spaces, nature reserves, parks etc)

Bless the Lord, O my soul, 

and all that is within me bless his holy name.

Bless the Lord, O my soul, 

and forget not all his benefits;

Bless the Lord, all you works of his,

in all places of his dominion; 

bless the Lord, O my soul.

Ps 103: 1-2, 22

Reading: And I heard every creature in heaven and on earth and under the earth and in the sea, and all that is in them, saying, “To him who sits on the throne and to the Lamb be blessing and honour and glory and might forever and ever!” Revelation 5:13

Response:
Everliving God, the heavens declare your praise and yet cannot contain your glory. 

We join with all creation in honouring you.

for frosty mornings and blue skies, 

and the fresh air we breathe:

We bless you, creator God;

for robins, sparrows and starlings, 

and all who visit our gardens:

We bless you, creator God;

For strong limbed trees and supple saplings, 

and all the strength they embody:

We bless you, creator God;

For fruits and roots, and leaves and shoots, 

and all the nourishment they provide:

We bless you, creator God;

For cats and dogs, our companionable friends, 

and foxes  and deer, our wilder friends:

We bless you, creator God;

For winter flowers and bumble bees, 

for winter’s work and rest: 

We bless you, creator God!

Let’s  offer intercessions for the well being of our local environment 

We pray for the work of the Wetlands Trust protecting birds and their habitats, and we give thanks for our local Wetlands reserve.

We pray for the work of Kew Gardens and the Millennium Seed Bank, for their work in protecting and nurturing plants and we give thanks for beauty of the gardens.

We pray for the work of the park rangers maintaining the wildness of Richmond Park with its great diversity of plant and animal life. We pray too for the work of Holly Lodge enabling the Park to be accessible to all.

We pray for those who work to protect the biodiversity of the Thames, and we give thanks for the wildlife returning to its waters.

We pray for the Friends of Sheen Common and of Palewell Common and for their safeguarding of these local green oases. We give thanks for joy that comes from playing and running, from playing sports and walking dogs.

We pray too for local gardeners and keepers of allotments, and for all who put out food and water for birds. We give thanks for the beauty of the front gardens we walk past.

As we notice the wonders of creation that surround us, 

we pray that what we see we will love,

and that what we love, we will protect, 

and that what we protect, will be blessed by God. 

Amen. 

Counting on … day 178

25th September 2024

What about edible playgrounds in our schools?

“Edible Playgrounds offer a lively, engaging, multi-sensory way to teach children about growing and eating healthy food. Aside from the physical health benefits that eating well brings, learning in an outdoor environment combats Nature Deficit Disorder and has been shown to increase mental health by boosting mood, confidence and self-esteem. Furthermore, allowing the children to connect with nature develops attentiveness and self-reliance in the pupils, leading to more sustainable behaviours in the long term.” (1)

Equally what about a school orchard?

“With a little maintenance and planning, trees give back so much more than we put into them. But they do need to be cared for, especially in the tender early years of their growth”. (2)

(1) https://www.treesforcities.org/our-work/schools-programme/edible-playgrounds

(2) https://treecouncil.org.uk/grants-and-guidance/our-grants/orchards-for-schools/

Trinity Sunday

26th May 2024

Reflection with readings below

Rublev’s icon of the Holy Trinity is perhaps one of the most iconic images of the Trinity. The three figures – visitors who arrived at Abraham’s tent by the oaks of Mamre – represent the three persons of the Trinity. Each is individual but related and all form a circle about the chalice at the centre of the table. The colours of their robes and the positioning of their hands and faces suggests the different characteristics they bring to their united existence and how their patterns of behaviour interrelate.


(There are plenty of web sites that explore the theology of this icon – eg https://sacredheartpullman.org/documents/2017/8/Trinityicon.pdf)

At the time the icon was painted, the Holy Trinity was understood as being the embodiment of unity of spirit, peace, harmony, mutual love and humility.

The interrelated and interdependent and mutually enhancing character of the Holy Trinity is also to be found in the natural world that is the Trinity’s creation. All parts of creation are interrelated and interdependent and when working together, enhance the whole. 

For example when the weather warms  in the spring, butterfly eggs hatch into caterpillars, which grow fat on new green plant shoots. At the same time butterflies that have hibernated overwinter, wake and begin a new round of egg laying. The superfluity of caterpillars provides food for newly hatched blue tit chicks, ensuring the next generation. Feeding caterpillars to the young chicks additionally prevents the complete loss of the new spring plant growth! Birds, insects, plants and the seasonal changes in temperature and rainfall work in harmony for the thriving of the ecosystem. This beautiful dance reflects the nature of our trinitarian God. 

We humans are as dependent on the smooth progress of this dance as any other creature. Without insects to pollinate crops, we would have a severely restricted diet – no fruit, no peas and beans, courgettes or tomatoes. Without the right amounts of sun and rain in due season, we face hunger as crops sown will not flourish and indeed may fail altogether – something we are seeing in the UK this year cereal crops.

Yet we humans are deliberately damaging our environment. We are pouring pollution into the seas and water ways. We are spraying crops with insecticides that wantonly kill of all manner of creatures – birds as well as insects. We are burning carbon fuels and releasing more and mo greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, warming the atmosphere at a disastrous rate. We are taking the goodness out of the soil reducing its fertility. We’re cutting down forests and replacing natural biodiversity with monocultures of crops and livestock, exacerbating the loss of ground water and nutrients and accelerating climate change. 

We fail to see ourselves as part of creation. We are not living in harmony with all our brothers and sisters of creation – and that means we are not living in harmony with the will of God. 

We have sinned and fallen short. We need to cry out to God, who is both our parent and the parent of all creation, asking for healing and mercy. We need to ask forgiveness of all our brothers and sisters in creation and be willing to likewise offer forgiveness to all who have harmed our shared life. We need to hang onto the truth that Jesus came not to condemn but to save the world. And like Isaiah, we must be ready to speak the truth and to act in accordance with the will and desire of the Trinity, following their example of living in unity of spirit, peace, harmony, mutual love and humility.

This is not just an airy-fairy spiritual dream for our hour in church. It is a real demand and challenge that comes from God and which can find a genuine response in practical action. Here in the UK we are facing a general election. We can enquire of our candidates what their policies are vis a vis the environment, the climate, and human-made pollution. We can ask for a commitment that we see laws and policies being implemented that will ensure an economic system that respects and works in harmony with creation. Green Christian has put together a package of ideas, questions and templates in response to the general election. The Zero Hour website has details and plans for a Climate and Nature Bill addressing these issues about the care of the environment, and practical resources to help communities in every constituency engage with prospective candidates so that this Bill can become a reality in the next Parliament. 

Ascribe to the divine Trinity the glory due their Name; worship their divine nature in the beauty of holiness.

Isaiah 6:1-8

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings: with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another and said:

“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory.”

The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And I said: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!”

Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touched my mouth with it and said: “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.” Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

Psalm 29

1 Ascribe to the Lord, you gods, *
ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

2 Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his Name; *
worship the Lord in the beauty of holiness.

3 The voice of the Lord is upon the waters;
the God of glory thunders; *
the Lord is upon the mighty waters.

4 The voice of the Lord is a powerful voice; *
the voice of the Lord is a voice of splendour.

5 The voice of the Lord breaks the cedar trees; *
the Lord breaks the cedars of Lebanon;

6 He makes Lebanon skip like a calf, *
and Mount Hermon like a young wild ox.

7 The voice of the Lord splits the flames of fire;
the voice of the Lord shakes the wilderness; *
the Lord shakes the wilderness of Kadesh.

8 The voice of the Lord makes the oak trees writhe *
and strips the forests bare.

9 And in the temple of the Lord *
all are crying, “Glory!”

10 The Lord sits enthroned above the flood; *
the Lord sits enthroned as King for evermore.

11 The Lord shall give strength to his people; *
the Lord shall give his people the blessing of peace.

Romans 8:12-17

So then, brothers and sisters, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh– for if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!” it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ– if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.

John 3:1-17

There was a Pharisee named Nicodemus, a leader of the Jews. He came to Jesus by night and said to him, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God; for no one can do these signs that you do apart from the presence of God.” Jesus answered him, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God without being born from above.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can anyone be born after having grown old? Can one enter a second time into the mother’s womb and be born?” Jesus answered, “Very truly, I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit. What is born of the flesh is flesh, and what is born of the Spirit is spirit. Do not be astonished that I said to you, ‘You must be born from above.’ The wind blows where it chooses, and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes. So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.” Nicodemus said to him, “How can these things be?” Jesus answered him, “Are you a teacher of Israel, and yet you do not understand these things?

“Very truly, I tell you, we speak of what we know and testify to what we have seen; yet you do not receive our testimony. If I have told you about earthly things and you do not believe, how can you believe if I tell you about heavenly things? No one has ascended into heaven except the one who descended from heaven, the Son of Man. And just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.

“For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not perish but may have eternal life.

“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.

Counting on … day 76

28th March 2024

Biodiversity is “the variety and variability of life on Earth. Biodiversity is a measure of variation at the genetic, species and ecosystem levels. Biodiversity is not distributed evenly on Earth; it is usually greater in the tropics as a result of the warm climate and high primary productivity in the region near the equator. Tropical forest ecosystems cover less than 10% of Earth’s terrestrial surface and contain about 50% of the world’s species.” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biodiversity)

Biodiversity is linked to climate change. When the climate is changing, ecosystems change and with them species must also adapt and change. If the climate change is rapid, some species may not be able to change at a sufficient pace and their numbers will decline rapidly. Conversely biodiversity is often boosted by practices designed to reduce climate change – eg planting more natural woodland, restoring natural habitats such as peat bogs and wet lands, etc benefits and therefore boosts biodiversity. 

Green Tau: issue 89

6th March 2024

Drax and the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

Earlier this week I joined an action outside the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero protesting against government plans to continue to subsidise Drax power station. Two key groups campaign against the unsustainable and unethical functioning of this power station – and its smaller sister at Lynemouth. They are ‘Axe Drax’ and ‘Biofuel Watch’. I was invited to speak on behalf of  Christian Action. This is what I said.

“As I come from a faith back ground and am part of Christian Climate Action, I thought I would reference one of the trees from the Bible – the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. We know we humans do not always make good choices, and it was probably not the best of choices that Adam and Eve made when they ate the fruit of the tree of knowledge of gold and evil. 

But once you have the knowledge of good and evil, would you not be very foolish to to make choices that will cause evil?

If you knew the difference between good and evil when it comes to cutting down primary old- growth forests, would you be foolish enough to continue to cut down those trees? Foolish enough to destroy those ancient and biodiverse habitats? Foolish enough to destroy that long term effective carbon sink?

If you know the difference between good and evil when it comes to shipping products half way round the world, would you be foolish enough to burn shipping fuel just to transport tonnes of timber pellets from the west coast of Canada to the east coast of England just to so you could burn them?

If you knew the difference between good and evil when it comes to generating energy, would you be foolish enough to burn anything when you could alternatively use renewable energy from the sun and the wind and the tides?

And would you be foolish enough to do so at a price that diverts £6 billion of tax payers’ money into subsidising those carbon emissions?

And would you be still foolish enough to offer a further £2.5 billion a year of tax payers’ money to continue importing and burning the wood from those precious forests?

Come on Department for Energy Security and Net Zero, think again! Use some common sense!!”

 “Drax Power Station, in North Yorkshire, burns 25 millions trees a year that are shipped in from across the world. In September 2022, it was revealed that Drax’s practices abroad are the cause of large scale environmental racism. Trees are condensed down to pellets in factories placed in predominantly Black communities in the global south. The process is so polluting, people are left struggling to breath and often trapped in their own homes. Drax presents itself as a world leader in using BECCS*, and is the worlds biggest burner of trees. They can only operate because of over £6billion in subsidies taken straight from our energy bills, supposedly for renewable energy.” (Axe Drax)

For more information on Drax and the campaign to end such power stations, see https://axedrax.uk/ and https://www.biofuelwatch.org.uk/axedrax-campaign/

*Bioenergy with carbon capture and storage is the process of extracting bioenergy from biomass and capturing and storing the carbon, thereby removing it from the atmosphere https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bioenergy_with_carbon_capture_and_storage

Counting on …day 26

26th January 2024

Support local nature reserves 

The National Biodiversity Network  reported last year  that “The UK’s wildlife is continuing to decline according to a new landmark study [State of Nature]. Already classified as one of the world’s most nature-depleted countries, nearly one in six of the more than ten thousand species assessed (16%) are at risk of being lost from Great Britain.” https://nbn.org.uk/news/state-of-nature-2023/

Yet nature offers us the best solutions to climate change if we at the same time take care to look after nature. Supporting nature reserves and the organisations that run them – such as the National Trust, the Wildlife Trust, the RSPB etc – is an effective way of tackling both the climate crisis and the biodiversity crisis. Support can be by donations/ membership and or volunteering.

Counting on … day 1.217

16th November 2023  

The lead author of the study into the health (or rather threatened health) of our woodlands, published in  ‘Forestry: An International Journal of Forest Research’, is Dr Eleanor Tew, head of forest planning at Forestry England and visiting researcher at the University of Cambridge. Whilst the threat of a collapse of our woodland ecosystems is possible, it is not inevitable. “We do have time to make a difference, and there is a lot we can do to make our forests more resilient,” said Tew, who described the paper as a “call for action”… The forestry industry has to plan in advance …. an average conifer in a plantation can take up to 60 years to reach maturity, and a broadleaf up to 150 years. “Forestry has always been about planning for the long-term, and we’re at a time of huge change,” said Tew. Solutions [could] include increasing the diversity of tree species within a wood, planting trees of different ages, promoting natural regeneration and managing deer populations.”(1)

The Forestry Journal published advice from ConFor the forestry’s  industry wide body  to improve tree planting:-

  • a coordinated UK-wide approach to the 30,000-hectare target, currently not in place;
  • planting targets to be clearly linked to delivering other policy objectives – mitigating climate change, supporting biodiversity and delivering rural jobs and growth;
  • clear targets to use more home-grown wood – the UK is the second highest global net importer of wood after China, and using more wood will lock up more carbon (2)

Growing timber for domestic use – eg construction, furniture making etc seems logical. Maybe we can help by specifying such products if we are making such purchases. 

(1) https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/nov/08/uk-forests-face-catastrophic-ecosystem-collapse-within-50-years-study-says-aoe?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other

(2) https://www.forestryjournal.co.uk/news/18834822.confor-calls-urgent-action-tackle-uk-tree-planting-failure/

Counting on … day 1.188

6th October 2023

Grass or rather grass lands as grass is seldom just grass but a collection of different plants inc,using grasses, is often overlooked when thinking about biodiversity. Perhaps cause grass sounds rather boring. But grasses come in different sorts and heights and colours.  Mixed with companion plants they create a variety of meadows and grasslands. This variety is created by and supports a diversity of wildlife. The height of the grass and the selection of companion plants at be determined by who is grazing the land. Land grazed by sheep will have a different range of plants from land grazed by cattle.   And then depending on what grasses and plants thrive, so a variety of different insects are accommodated and with them a further variety of birds and small animals. 

In gardens we can maintain different areas of grass at different levels and see how the variety of other plants and wildlife varies.

https://www.plantlife.org.uk/our-work/incredible-grasslands/

Counting on…day 1.148

14th August 2023

People sometimes think of protecting the environment as being about protecting rural landscapes, keeping them remote and unspoilt. But in reality we cannot separate what we do in urban areas from what do in rural areas or what we do in rural areas from what we do in urban areas,  if we wish to care for the environment. Everything is interconnected. The pollution from our urban areas affects the air and soil in rural areas. Pollution from farming affects air and water ways. The carbon emissions from urban areas contributes to the global heating that affects everyone, everywhere. If we want to keep our landscapes green and rich in biodiversity, then we need to cut back on the amount of energy we use to heat our buildings, to cut back our use of  motorised transport, to make more efficient use of water and other resources, to cut back our use of plastics, and ensure that what we recycle forms a closed loop. And do so wherever we live and work.

Counting on … day 1.130

17th July 2023

Earlier I wrote about the bee hotel in our garden and its high level of occupancy (https://greentau.org/2023/05/21/counting-on-day-1-117-2/)

I have since read in the RSPB magazine that the bee larvae won’t hatch out until next spring and that to protect them against the cold, it is a good idea to put the bee hotel in a shed or porch over the winter, before returning the hotel to its outside location in the spring.