Peace on Earth. Heaven knows we need it. There was a nice message at midnight mass last night. (St Mary's Lowe House, St Helens, UK). Father Tom Gagie asked us all to look at the manger at the side of the church. And to notice that there are no doors. All are welcome. There are no strangers and no others in this world. No one is shut out. There are no doors to close in the faces of others. And even if there were, no one would want to anyway. There's room for all. With the enoughness of things, there is plenty for all to share, in joy and peace. It's a vision of all human and non-human animals living together in the one home. Seeing the world as a bountiful gift, there is more than enough to go around. And there is a joy in sharing, in giving and in receiving. Is it beyond us to devise a political system that embodies that ethic?
Nancy Faber’s wooden manger scene was made in Germany in the 1970s. She adds new animals to the set every year. I like the idea. With the destruction of habitats and the continuing loss of species, we desperately need that biophilia that my favourite biologist E.O. Wilson writes of, and Erich Fromm before him.
I believe that the man choosing progress can find a new unity through the development of all his human forces, which are produced in three orientations. These can be presented separately or together: biophilia, love for humanity and nature, and independence and freedom.
Fromm, E. The Heart of Man: Its Genius for Good and Evil, 1965
With diverse life forms cramped together, this little stable is a microcosm of our existence on planet Earth – crowded, precarious, fragile, bound together in a struggle for survival, but most of all dependent on each other and upon nature’s life support systems. We are none of us autonomous, there is no 'other.' You + I + other beings and bodies in the More-than-Human World is the ecological ethic that affirms the unity of human and planetary flourishing.
More on this theme from me here: Rainbow Rising
"You may call God love, you may call God goodness.
But the best name for God is compassion."
-- Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)
For more on this theme:
Nobodies
And strangers
Enter the holy of holies
And meet God
In the flesh
As a baby.
It is as if the curtain in the temple
Was torn asunder
By grace
Not works
By love
Not law
By a baby born.
"in those scenes that many of us set up in cribs at the front of our church buildings lies the greatest of all Gospel truth. Through this baby the ordinary man or woman can now enter into the presence of God and have a relationship with God."
And the non-human animals too!
This ethic changes everything. In our own lives and in the world around us. It gives the spiritual resources to transform our communities for the better, making room for each and all, to build a hope that has a firm foundation in the recognition of our social and natural dependence.