Weekly Celebrations, Actions and Meditations
To Promote Earth Stewardship
Week 5:
April 20-26: “Let the water teem with living creatures, and let birds fly above
the earth across the expanse of the sky.” (Genesis 1:20, NIV).
Focus on God’s
creation of sealife and birds. In answer to a question by a student
about evolution vs. religion, a college professor once stated that she had no
problem reconciling the two since the evolution account follows the Genesis
account quite well. Birds are mentioned after sea creatures and before land
animals. Of course, this is a gross oversimplification of evolution, but we
know that birds are very closely related to reptiles and that the evolutionary
line goes from fish to amphibians to reptiles to birds. This is a fascinating
line of thought. Why did the writer(s) of Genesis mention birds before land
animals? The answer is only found when one looks at the course of evolution.
Consider the
puzzles God gave us to unravel through science and how much richer life is with
sealife and birds. Both reptiles, such as alligators and crocodiles, and
waterfowl, such as geese and ducks, are largely dependent on bodies of water.
More of the earth is covered by water than by land and the ocean depths are the
last frontier on this planet.
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Celebration
- Take a tour
of the Baltimore Aquarium.
- Take kids to
the Smithsonian Museum and follow the evolution of animals.
- Go to the
beach and listen to the birds.
- Arise at
5:30 am and listen to bird songs.
- Buy a tape
or CD of common bird songs and begin to identify birds by their calls.
- Watch the
Animal Planet series and see the intriguing displays of rainforest birds.
- Buy a field
guide to the birds and go for a bird watching walk.
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Action
- Bring your
own reusable bag to the store. Reduce use of plastic bags, which are bad news
in waterbodies because some animals think they are food.
- On your next
nature/beach walk, take a bag along and pick up trash. If you fish and your
line gets tangled or snagged, cut loose as close to the snag as you can and
don't throw the tangle over the side, lest the abandoned line strangle a
critter. Fishing gear accounts for almost half of all entanglements.
- Participate
in the International Coastal Cleanup on the third Saturday of September. Call
1-800-CMCBEACH for details.
- Never
release helium balloons into the air outside. What goes up must come down.
Their impact in a body of water is similar to that of a plastic bag.
- Put out bird
food and bird nesting boxes. If you begin feeding birds, keep doing so, to
avoid future starvation.
- Plant native
plants that are good bird food, such as berry-producing plants.
- Make sure
your outdoor cat is wearing a bird bell to help ensure that birds won’t fall
into his/her clutches.
- Buy
environmentally friendly seafood. Salmon are natural predators. Shrimp are
natural filter feeders and detritivores, but when farm-raised and fed
fishmeal, they, too, become predators. For every pound of farm-raised seafood
you eat, ten pounds of wild-caught seafood has been used in its production.
Eating high on the food chain is expensive for an ecosystem! Shrimp farming
continues to have devastating impacts on the environment and rural communities
of economically disadvantaged people in Asia and Latin America.
- Join an
environmental organization such as Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, WWF,
Greenpeace, Christian Ecology Link, A Rocha, or the Ocean Conservancy.
Christian Aid and Tearfund are also focusing increasingly on environmental
issues.
- Participate
in a trail/stream clean-up. Never throw trash into a waterbody!
Meditation
Think about the role of your church within its local
environment. What could be done to make your church more environmentally
friendly?
Week 6: Land Animals
