It is a great pleasure to be here with you this morning and I bring greetings from the Dean and Grace Cathedral in San Francisco. I hope you will visit us there some day. The subject of my sermon this morning is stewardship of Creation and I imagine you are not surprised. I think you were told or warned ahead of time.

Many people still wonder what does our faith tell us about caring for the natural world? I am often challenged to come up with New Testament verses that support certain environmental issues such as forest conservation, dying coral reefs, genetically engineered crops and so on. The only easy one is endangered species. With that one you needn’t go farther than the covenant between God and Noah which is easily the first endangered species act. Looking through Scripture for these passages is fun, but finding them is hard. No where does it say. " Leave the remaining ancient redwood trees in the northwest for future generations to enjoy or spotted owls to nest in." And no where does it say, "get your electricity from the wind turbines and every church must have solar on the roof".

The Old Testament is full of land use suggestions, food that shouldn’t be eaten and how it should be prepared, and endless suggestions that we are in harmonious relationship with the creation that sustains us, and we have a duty to maintain balance between us and nature.

The New Testament has little of that, perhaps because the authors thought it had all been covered before, but whatever the reason there is little environmental protection covered in the New Testament.

Christians have a designated role nonetheless. We were created in the image of God and have special responsibility to care for what God loves. We denounce evil that destroys creation when we are baptized. Throughout the New Testament are lessons to love one another, speak the truth, practice justice and share what you have. Another responsibility of being Christian is one stating we must set an example and people will know us by our love and the way we behave. Jesus asks us to be willing to take risk when we stand up for justice and peace. We mustn’t allow one group of people to oppress others for reasons of greed, profit, or material wealth; we are called to fill ourselves with spiritual things, not worldly goods; and not to hoard but to share our wealth. These are Christian values.

But if we are searching for actual quotes that tell us to be good stewards of the earth we do best drawing from our Jewish roots. God put Adam in the garden to "till it and to keep it". God gave us dominion, which means responsibility for the preservation of…. And it is the same kind of dominion that God has for us. Love and Compassion. AND God called the Creation "good" which makes it sacred. All life is sacred. Furthermore, all things are connected and interrelated. If we destroy our natural resources we are ultimately destroying ourselves.

Perhaps the most powerful environmental ethic of all is found in both the Old Testament and the New Testament is the first and great commandment. Most of us know this by heart and it is the simplest and most profound instruction for environmental stewardship. Thou shall love the Lord your God with all you heart, with all your soul and with all your mind. And the second is like unto it, thou shall love your neighbor as yourself. You heard it in the reading this morning. "You shall love your neighbor as yourself." There is no other commandment greater than these.

Lets talk about that and see how it translates for us today. First, who are our neighbors? The answer to that may be more inclusive than we realize. Our Christian faith may be broader and include others than you formerly realized. Think of it this way, In the beginning, all the followers of Jesus were Jews. Soon they had to ask…."And what about our neighbors, the Samaritans, are they in or out?" They concluded that they had to be included. And next they asked about the Gentiles. In or out? In, as well. And the Children? In or out? In, also. And what about our interior life, our motivations and the ethical standards by which we live? They too are included. Today we can ask, what about the animals and other species, In or out? What about the next generation and the future? In or out? What about air and water? In or out? People on the other side of the world struggling for land and food? Aren’t they our neighbors, too?

Shortly before Paul died, after he had spent most of a lifetime preaching and writing about the consequences of what he believed about Christ, he wrote a letter to the Colossians. In it he set down the remarkable conclusion, that nothing in the whole of the Universe was left out. He wrote: "Through the son, God decided to bring the whole Universe back to himself. God made peace through his son’s death on the cross, and so brought back to himself all things, both on earth and in heaven."

Life is religious and life is sacred. That makes protecting what is sacred a responsibility of religious life and, at least for me establishes that everything God created is not only a neighbor and included in our faith, but will be reconciled to God through Christ.

Listen to the words from the gospel of John:

"In the beginning was the Word... and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and without him not one thing came into being."

Now, how do we treat our neighbors? Do we love them? Do we live the kind of life that demonstrates love for neighbor? Do we live lives that demonstrate love of our children and their future? Do we live on the land as if we love it? ... Every one of our behaviors affects someone else and we need to become more aware of how our behavior affects them. It is hard to believe that the coffee we drink, the cars we drive, the clothes we wear, the electricity we use, the trash we throw out, the chemicals we put on our plants, all affect others. The water we waste when brushing our teeth, the air we pollute while sitting in a car with the engine running unnecessarily. These are little things, but if every one of us pays attention we can make a difference. We matter. One by one we can make a difference. God calls us to be fully human which means being fully alive and awake (aware). Each of us matters and each of our behaviors matter. I know it doesn’t seem to be helping when you are walking to the recycling center carrying your bottles and cans, and an overloaded garbage truck speeds by, but it does. It matters a lot.

Our call as good Christians is to love our neighbor. AND maybe with some consciousness raising we CAN transform our behavior to reflect that we really do care about our neighbors, we love them. It simply means being thoughtful, what the Buddhist call mindful.

I have hope that we will turn around the destructive trend that seems to have taken over our culture. My hope comes from the fact that more and more people are getting the message and changing. The notion that more and bigger makes you more worthy, is beginning to loose its hold on our culture. The Toyota Prius is a hybrid car that is "Car of the Year", and is rapidly becoming popular because it doesn’t pollute like regular cars and it doesn’t use as much gas. People want to do the right thing; we just need to become aware.

We have 270 congregations in California that have joined our Interfaith Power and Light program, one of which is yours. Churches with solar on their roofs that are setting examples for the community. During that huge black out last summer, on there was a little church in Wyandott, Michigan that had lights, food, and a working computer to make pay roll, because they have a $600. wind turbine and solar panels on the roof. St. Elizabeth’s was serving the community in a new way. We can do this. Solar and wind do not pollute the air or contribute to the bad quality of air often hanging over poor neighborhoods where the dirty burning power plants are located. We have Interfaith Power and Light programs in fourteen states around the country. This is good news!

The religious community must come forth with the moral and ethical values that it has always brought to important issues that affect the common good. Religion brings the spiritual awareness that motivates change, and it is our responsibility. We sit in pews every Sunday and process our love for God. And in the prayers of the People we pray for a reverence for the Earth. If we destroy our natural resources, like air and water, we not only are insulting our neighbors, but we are insulting God. Our job is to protect what God loves and God loves all that God created, Neighbors and natural resources alike.

Praying is an important part of our lives, but at a time when we are rapidly and irresponsibly destroying our natural resources, we need more than prayer. We need to put our faith into action.

We are all connected to the natural world through our complete and utter dependency on a healthy ecosystem to live healthy lives. If we poison a natural resource we are ultimately poisoning ourselves, because everything is interconnected and interdependent. If we pollute the air we have to breathe it. The same goes for water, our rivers, oceans and streams. If we knowingly pollute our neighbor’s air or water, we are not fulfilling either of the first two commandments.

I hesitate to call it sin, but in many ways it is. The ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, head of the Greek Orthodox Church came out a couple of years ago with a statement saying that environmental degradation IS a sin. A sin against God and our neighbor.

I am going to close with one last thought for you. Should anyone challenge you about environmental issues not belonging in church, let me assure you that it does belong here. It belongs here right beside love, peace, and justice. How can we, as people of faith, who profess a love for God and God’s creation sit-back or standby and watch Creation be destroyed. We cannot! We are the ones who must lead the environmental movement. Not for political reasons, scientific, or economic reasons, but because protection of creation is central to a religious life and we are the institution that has forever stood for justice and peace. We are the stewards of God’s Creation and we are the ones who must set the example and lead. If we don’t, then who will? Amen.