Earth Day 2010!
April 22nd, 2010
April 22nd marks the 40th anniversary of Earth Day. Forty years after the first Earth Day, the world is in greater peril than ever. While climate change is the greatest challenge of our time, it also presents the greatest opportunity – an unprecedented opportunity to build a healthy, prosperous, clean energy economy now and for the future. Consumption patterns also pose a threat. Today’s consumption is undermining the environmental resource base and exacerbating inequalities.
Daniel LeBlanc, OMI – now in Bolivia for the Alternative Climate Summit sent the following for our contemplation and action on Earth Day:
Resources:
Season for the Earth Resources
Earth Day 2010 Climate Declaration
A PRAYER FOR SANITY IN THE NUCLEAR AGE
Loving Creator –
We mourn and remember.
We remember the tragedy, the loss, and the pain of our actions.
We remember those dark clouds we created that took the breath of life.
You have provided us with abilities to create;
Yet we have used them to undo.
We have fashioned swords of mass destruction and fallen upon them.
We have used our collective abilities for suicide…
Help us not just to remember, but to recognize.
To take responsibility.
To be responsible for the precious yet delicate gift of life you have given us.
Help us to be responsible with our abilities:
To use them for life and the flourishing of life.
Help us to continue to call out: “We will study war no more.”
And help us to twist the swords of destruction into pruning hooks and plowshares.
Help us that we might turn the tide of loss, tragedy, and pain toward your will for life and love.
In your many wonderful names.
Amen
Prepared for use at the Interfaith Convocation of the NPT Review Conference, Rally, March and Festival May 2nd, 2010, by Preston Davis, Union Theological Seminary and Fellowship of Reconciliation.
See also the Litany for Sanity in the Nuclear Age (below).
Haiti & Kenya: A Unique Global South Partnership
Since 2007 the Green Belt Movement of Kenya has partnered with the Lambi Fund of Haiti to address economic and environmental challenges at the grassroots level. Now this unique long-term partnership is adapting to the effects of the devastating earthquake in January. Read more…
MDG Summit:
Only five years remain to achieve the MDGs, and despite some progress we are falling short. Now improvements in the lives of the poorest are being further eroded by the onset of global economic, food and climate crises. UN Member States will come together this September for an MDG Summit. To keep civil society stakeholders informed on the latest developments related to the summit process, the UN Millennium Campaign and the UN Non-Governmental Liaison Service (UN-NGLS) have launched a new website http://www.un-ngls.org/spip.php?page=mdg2010 . You can also find information on the General Assembly Interactive Session on the MDGs (4-13-10) see below.
POST COPENHAGEN:
More than three months have gone by since the Copenhagen Accord was adopted at the UN Climate Change Conference (COP-15) in Denmark last December, where differing opinions abounded as to whether the Conference had been a success or an outright failure. In the wake of Copenhagen, there has been frustration and confusion over how governments will be able to move forward on reaching a legally binding treaty to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Follow this story and more through the UN’s NGLS Civil Society Observer at: http://www.un-ngls.org/spip.php?article2237
WORLD PEOPLE’S CONFERENCE ON CLIMATE CHANGE AND THE RIGHTS OF MOTHER EARTH
– Cochabamba, Bolivia – April 19th to 22nd 2010
More than 20,000 people of civil society from 142 countries are participating actively in this effort to bring concrete proposals to all countries who will once again try to negotiate a serious agreement in regards to climate change in Mexico in December of this year. There are also official representatives of 47 countries participating. In two more days the results of this conference and work on the part of civil society will be available, as is a great deal of information, at the following (in Spanish and English) – http://pwccc.wordpress.com/
Litany for Sanity in the Nuclear Age
May we remember and mourn
Those who died in Hiroshima and Nagasaki
Those who use their gifts to create weapons of mass destruction
Those who have died of cancer and disease from exposure to nuclear tests
Those who today suffer from these diseases and those not yet born who will
Those islands that were destroyed in nuclear weapons tests
Those who would sow fear by threatening to use nuclear weapons
Those who fund new generations of weaponry
Those who profit from the manufacture of nuclear weapons.
WE REMEMBER AND MOURN
WE LIFT UP OUR VOICES IN LAMENTATION
WE CRY OUT FOR FORGIVENESS ANE REDEMPTION
We who are silent in the face of madness
When nuclear weapons are developed and deployed around the world
When monies are allocated to the development of new weapons
When world leaders threaten to use nuclear weapons in war
When our investments, our pension funds, are used to build weapons
When we still our consciences rather than speak out
When we hear hateful speech and do not object
When voices of belligerence escalate and put us all at odds with one another
When our children and grandchildren to the 7th generation are put at risk
Of damnation and extinction
WE REMEMBER AND MOURN
WE LIFT UP OUR VOICES IN RESISTANCE AND APPEAL
WE SING OUT FOR WISDOM AND DELIVERANCE
I call to mind that which I cannot bear to imagine life without, lost forever
The sweet fruit and grains of the earth and daily sustenance
The music of children laughing in play
The warm embrace of family and friends
The earth as seen from the moon, green and blue
The world as seen through the eyes of peace without borders
The dew of dawn and the soft breeze of sunset
The sunlight beams on clover leaf and pine
The awe of creation and echoes of the creator spirit
WE REMEMBER AND MOURN
WE OPEN OUR IMAGINATIONS AND HEARTS TO MEMORIES YET TO BE MADE
WE CALL OUT FOR LEADERSHIP AND RESOLVE
Hear me as I commit to myself and to you, neighbor, friend, fellow living being
My heart, I will soften and open to my brothers and sisters around the world
My neighbor, I will love as myself.
My nation, I will call to account for bringing peace and justice to the world
My species and all living things, I will cherish, protect and celebrate.
WE REMEMBER AND WE MOURN
BUT WE DO NOT DESPAIR
WE DO NOT ACCEPT
WE FEAR NOT
WE LIVE
AND
WE LOVE
Prepared for use as part of the Interfaith Convocation of the NPT Review Conference, Rally, March and Festival May 2nd, 2010
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