October 2024

Greetings!

When I arrived at church last week, two brilliantly-coloured ceramic butterflies greeted me!

They’re fabulous! Brightening our September dulled garden and companioning a nearby commemorative stone butterfly. And, thanks to phone cameras, these china winged-ones were able to bring a blessing to someone in our community. THANK YOU, gifter!

Butterflies are special beings. Their beauty, their extraordinary lifecycle, and their hard work on behalf of flowers and fruits, food and fibre production deserve our admiration and appreciation. And PRESERVATION!

As with other pollinators, butterfly populations have been dramatically reduced by habitat loss, pesticide use, and climate change. In the US alone, five different species of butterflies have become extinct since 1950. And, in July 2022, the IUCN, placed the monarch butterfly on its Red List of threatened species.i The entire population – the entire existence - of Danaus plexippus plexippus is under threat.

It would be tragic to lose the monarch or any other butterfly species. And it would tough to adjust to the agricultural impact of widespread pollinator loss. Most terrible of all, species loss (of any sort) injures God.

Australian theologian, Denis Edwards wrote:

“No one creature, not even the human, can image God by itself. Only the diversity of life - huge soaring trees, the community of ants, the flashing colors of the parrot, the beauty of a wildflower, along with the human – can give expression to the radical diversity and otherness of the trinitarian God.”ii

If butterflies are eliminated, God’s image will be diminished proportionally.

Wipe out Joshua trees and there goes the “Joshua tree” bit of God. All creatures – including you and me – are needed to give full expression to God’s goodness and love.

For the psalmist, though, it was the stars and species that take flight who are the Number One proclaimers of God’s glory.

“The heavens keep telling

the wonders of God,

and the skies declare

what God has done.”iii

Let’s keep their voices LOUD!

And multitudinous!

Heavenly blessings to you all,

Brenda

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i Internation Union for Conservation of Nature, PRESS RELEASE 21 JULY, 2022 “Migratory monarch butterfly now Endangered - IUCN Red List”

ii Denis Edwards, “Ecology at the Heart of Faith,” Orbis Books, 2006, p. 78

iii Psalm 19:1 Contemporary English Version

September 2024

“I’ve wiped the slate of all your wrongdoings.”

Isaiah 44:22 The Message

Greetings!

What are your best loved memories of September?

Back to school? Back to church? Back to friends not seen since June?

For many people in the Northern Hemisphere, September marks the year’s beginning. New classes, new clothes, and new resolutions.

British pupils wear school uniforms so there are no fashion outfits to look forward to. But I eagerly anticipated the handing out of fresh exercise-books. “Rough books” with no doodles. Subject notebooks with no disparaging remarks. No red “X’s”!

What a joy! Every September, we began anew. All evidence of failure or faded interest had gone in the bin. In their place, were clean white pages that held endless promise.

“I will not scribble! I will not skive off! This year, I will succeed!”

A promise of a fresh start that God makes to us every moment of every day.

“I’ve wiped your slate clean,” God tells us through Isaiah.

“Your mistakes and muck-ups are all deleted.”

What a joy! Our wrongs are erased. Our faith wobbles were never even recorded.

God doesn’t do red “X’s”!

(Making amends to someone we hurt is, of course, not dependent on ticks or “X’s”.)

This September let’s celebrate “fresh slate” month and every “fresh slate” minute of this month. All 43,200 of them!

God’s blackboard monitor has her hands full!

Buy yourself a new notebook. Jot down prayers, observations, Christmas must-do’s. Every new page is a reminder that God sees only your future promise; past messes have been binned!

Sing it till you believe it. :)

God has blotted them out,

I’m happy and glad and free!

God has blotted them out,

I’ll turn to Isaiah and see.

Chapter forty-four,

twenty-two and three:

God’s blotted them out,

and now I can shout,

for that means me!

May September be the beginning of a year filled with new blessings!

Brenda

Summer 2024

The stars shine in their watches and rejoice. When God calls them, they say, "Here we are!" And so with cheerfulness they show light to him who made them.i

Greetings!

Last week, while I was seed shopping at the Essex Coop, the manager and I began to chat about squirrels and how they conquer every SQUIRREL-PROOF feeder. I suggested that these very clever rodents draw up blueprints, indicating distances and jumping angles, so that they can calculate access routes. Wes disagreed; he thought they log on to Squirrel YouTube channels & watch “how to” videos.

Both of us agreed that they are smarter than us. And both of us were delighted by that fact. Squirrels are fun and humbling at the same time – perfect for keeping us grounded in our own creatureliness.

For we, like our fluffy and feathered neighbours, are all part of God’s Creation. All children of the same Heavenly Parent. All filled with the Divine presence. Thomas Aquinas (d. 1274) stated that, “God is in all things, and innermostly.”ii

Innermostly! What a marvellous way to describe God’s indwelling! Butterflies, beluga whales, and basset hounds are all bearers of the Holy. Our Creator is as deeply embedded in squirrels as he is in you and me. No wonder we can’t keep them out of our bird feeders!

I can imagine God-in-the-squirrel having a good laugh with God-in-me as I fail yet again to keep Her Furriness out of the suet. Hot pepper suet that animals are supposed to hate! I hope I’m not giving my squirrel siblings stomach-ache. … Should I add an antacid to the feeder?

For those of us who are passionate about our planet, this radical indwelling - this “deep incarnation” – is good news.iii The Holy One is on Nature’s side. She is IN Nature’s self.

All created life reflects God’s glory. And the more creatures can flourish - in their own unique ways - the more the Creator is honoured.

Squirrelness glorifies God!

Have fun-in-the-sun with God!

Find your own “squirrelness”!

And may this summer richly bless you.

Brenda

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i Baruch 3: 34-35, World English Bible

ii Thomas Aquinas, in Elizabeth Johnson, “Come, Have Breakfast,” Orbis Books, 2024

iii Niels Gregerson, ibid.