There is an old evangelical term that I don’t hear in my religious circles much any more: “convicted.” It’s a legal term to most people, and in Christianity, when you are “convicted,” it means pretty much the same thing as in legalspeak: to be found guilty. In Christian terms, it means we are struck hard with our guilt for something or other.

I spent part of this weekend at a conference here at Christmount which was led by an eco-theologian, Dr. Leah D. Schade, Assistant of Preaching and Worship at Lexington Theological Seminary (check out her blog at http://www.patheos.com/blogs/ecopreacher/).  She did a couple of things that really struck me, and I want to share them with you. Maybe they’ll do something similar for you.

First, I want to say that I truly care for our planet. I’m not perfect about my care, but then I’m not known for being perfect at much of anything. I AM aware of how even little things like turning off the water while I brush my teeth can make an impact on the world. We’ve recycled for years, we quit buying styrofoam stuff ages ago, I finally bought a Prius, and we try to turn off most of our lights when we are not using an area of the house. We’re trying to do more.

But I’m not much in the way of an “evangelical” environmentalist: I don’t usually preach to people (except my camp staff!) about things they are not doing, I don’t drive my friends crazy by being a one-note song, and I don’t complain about those who disagree with me, either because I’m NOT that way or because they don’t do the first thing to help save the planet.

No matter how good you think you are at something, though, there is always more to learn. One of the reasons I love the saying, “Better to be silent and thought a fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt” is that as a youngster, I was good at the latter: opening my mouth and revealing my ignorance. So good at it was I that I perfected it in college (you may leave your examples in the “comments” section, “friends!”). I like to think of these latter days as my gently testing the waters of “my opinion,” realizing as I do that, like bodies, all of us have, and trying to remember to respect those with different ones than mine.

This weekend, I learned a couple of new ways to think about ecology. I’m grateful not only to Dr. Schade, but to the participants of Christmount’s annual “Elders and Deacons Workshop” who shared some of their insights and passion for this beautiful world of which we are a part. The first thing that struck me as valueable was having the group talk to each other about their environmental biography, in which they talked about their parents’, grandparents’, and even great-grandparents’ relationship to the land, how that changed over the years, and then their own understanding of that relationship. She ended the evening with a sermon/liturgical dance of Mother Earth praying excitedly to God at he beginning of creaton that she couldn’t wait for what was “next” in creation. The sadness as the sermon progressed and the humans began not loving but hurting her and losing their connection to her. There were authenticly teary moments among our little group.

This morning, we were challenged to go out into nature and see what spoke to us, drew us closer, and then to bring it to the group and share as though we were that thing: one person was water, another was a tall tree, and we even had lichen speak to us! Some people noticed the change in weather patterns that was causing confusion to many plants and animals.

I thought about my beloved crows, who are so smart that they recognize different human faces; they seem to be outside in the parking lot all the time during the spring, summer, and fall, and I know that they know me. I cannot tell one of them from another, but I often speak to them quietly as they scream at me when I walk past (although I have noticed that they don’t fly away as quickly as they used to, making me think that they may have told the others , “he’s a little strange but basically okay, “which is kind of how I move through the world anyway, so it’s all good!

It was beautiful to listen to participants talk about the interconnectedness of everthing. We were reminded that St. Francis used to preach to the animals and plants around him. And sad to realize how Christianity has married itself to capitalism to the point that places like my little town allows every stand of forest and pasture to be bought up and built on “in the name of progress,” as though progress will survive without air, water, and plants, and the real sorrow of this is that too many of the supporters of this kind of development consider themselves – and are considered by many of their pastors and fellow church members – to be “good, Christian people.” Hmmm.

But I cannot worry too much about them. I need to make sure that I’m doing better. Does the light in my office have to be on all day? What needs to be unplugged? What will I do with my trash? Can anything be reused.

Oh, my, I am going to be a problem child again!