This sermon is by Rev. Joe Shore-Goss, my husband.

This is the air I breathe

Welcome, Sulfur Dioxide

This is the air I breathe

Hello, Carbon Monoxide

Your Holy presence

The air, the air

Living in me is everywhere.

This is my daily bread

Breathe Deep

This is my daily Bread

While I sleep

Your very word

Breathe deep

Is spoken to me.

And I am desperate for you,

And I am lost without you.

This is the air I breathe

Bless you, alcohol blood stream

This is the air I breathe

Save me nicotine lung steam

Your Holy Presence

Incense, Incense

Living in me, is in the air

This is my daily bread

Breathe Deep

This is my daily Bread

While I sleep

Your very word

Breathe deep

Is spoken to me.

And I’m cataclysmic ectoplasm

And I’m fallout atomic orgasm

Desperate for you

And I’m vapor and fume

I’m lost at the stone of my tomb without you

And I breathing like a sullen perfume

Desperate for you

Eating at the stone of my tomb

I’m lost without you,

Looking rather attractive

I’m lost without you,

Now that I’m radio active

I’m desperate for you,

Just watch me spark

Cry out to live

I glow in the dark

I am desperate for you

Breathe deep

I’m lost

While I sleep

I’m Lost

Breathe deep

I’m lost without you
h up of this is the air I breathe by Michael W. Smith and Air from Hair by James Rado, Gerome Ragni. It is actually the first thing I thought of when I knew I had sky Sunday. The imagery that these two images bring about can be, and I hope it was, disturbing.

When I used to drive into Los Angeles from Palm Springs it would strike me as I came over the one hill and looking into the basin of Los Angeles there was a yellow/brownish haze just hanging over the city. The air is everywhere and this is the air we breathe.

The original Gospel assigned for today speaks of the sky turning dark for 3 hours as Christ hung on the cross. I choose instead the reading where Christ actually says red sky at night sailors delight red sky in morning sailors take warning…well more or less.

The other readings one is from Jeremiah and it says;
Jeremiah 4:23-28 Common English Bible (CEB)

23 I looked at the earth,
And it was without shape or form;
At the heavens
And there was no light.
24 I looked at the mountains
And they were quaking;
All the hills were rocking back and forth.
25 I looked and there was no one left;
Every bird in the sky had taken flight.
26 I looked and the fertile land was a desert;
All its towns were in ruins
Before the Lord,
Before his fury.
27 The Lord proclaims:
The whole earth will become a desolation,
But I will not destroy it completely.
28 Therefore, the earth will grieve
And the heavens grow dark

And still a 3rd reading form the psalms says;
Psalm 19
For the music leader. A psalm of David.

19 Heaven is declaring God’s glory;
The sky is proclaiming his handiwork.
2 One day gushes the news to the next,
And one night informs another what needs to be known.
3 Of course, there’s no speech, no words—
Their voices can’t be heard—
4 but their sound[a] extends throughout the world;
Their words reach the ends of the earth.
God has made a tent in heaven for the sun.
5 The sun is like a groom
Coming out of his honeymoon suite;
Like a warrior, it thrills at running its course.
6 It rises in one end of the sky;
Its circuit is complete at the other.
Nothing escapes its heat.

There is a theme here which is the voice of creation, or more specifically the way which the sky not only announces and celebrates God’s presence, but also sympathizes with Creation when it suffers.

Have you ever watched the skies when a storm was brewing, black clouds rolling? In like wall after wall of waves? Have you ever had a sense of God’s presence in?

The storm or God’s voice in the thunder as many ancient peoples did? (Note
Psalm 29!) Have you ever sensed that eerie feeling that comes during an eclipse? When all the animals are spooked?

Why is the sky so important to us? Our moods seem to change with the weather—When the sun shines we are likely to be happier than when darkness covers the sky. Why? What does the sky mean to us? Is our faith influenced by the sky or related to The sky in some way?

It is interesting to note that in general when the Old Testament refers to heavens the original Hebrew could be translated as sky or skies, and really that often works better, for me anyway for then the air around us, above us and beyond us. All of this space is where God dwells. God is living, according to the Old Testament, here between us.

We take God in…This is the air I breathe. We exhale God…This is the air I breathe. We harm and foul God with pollutants form cigarette smoke to exhaust from Coal mines and power plants. We made the Earth a member of our congregation and yet we walk in God daily.

In Jeremiahs vision he sees an enemy about to destroy all that God has created. As a matter of fact the season of creation author describes it this way;
“The Disaster he sees coming is so destructive he depicts the event as if it were a reversal of the original acts of creation. To understand this vision we need to return to the events of Genesis One.

Consider the following:
Compare v. 23 with Gen. 1.1: Return to pre-creation – all is ‘waste and void’
Compare v. 23 with Day One: No light in the sky
Compare v. 25 with Day Five: No birds in the sky
Compare v. 26 with Day Three: No vegetation comes from the land/Earth
Jeremiah’s vision turns the whole of the original creation process upside down. This Portrait, moreover, is more than a metaphor.”

If we look around us we can see this destruction happening around us every day. Fires are wiping out acres of vegetation. Drought is devastating our state. In other parts floods and mudslides are wiping out villages where glaciers are disappearing, and ocean tides are rising. Jeremiah ends his vision by predicting the earth will mourn the sky will turn black.

I have seen the sky turn black and the sun disappear due to the big fires in Oakland. I have seen the sky turn from a haze to a dark orange to fill with soot due to nearby fires. Jeremiah has laments where he speaks further of the earth mourning and the land crying aloud to God. I believe in many cases this is happening today. The land is crying out and some are listening.

The author of the Seasons of creation sky Sunday bible study tells us; “We have created a hole in the ozone layer. By excessive use of various sprays and chemicals we have released chlorofluorocarbon molecules into the atmosphere. In the stratosphere chlorine atoms escape from these molecules and attack the ozone molecules. The resulting ‘hole’ first appeared over the South Pole, but the ozone layer is thinning over other continents. Because of this thinning, UV rays from the sun have now increased and so have skin cancer rates. (though , due to changes we have made,, in a study released this summer if we stay the path the ozone may heal by 2070)

There are many ways in which we have polluted our skies. The combustion of fossil fuels in factories and cars produces a host of noxious materials that fill our skies. One of the common effects is smog. Air pollution is no longer a crisis we can avoid.”

I must say we are getting better but our dependency on fossil fuels is still way too high. We are still in the very early stages of switching from more hybrid and fuel cell cars but I believe we are getting there. We, as you know, have most of our electricity generated from the sun.

People have shrugged at solar energy claiming it is a flash in the pan or not viable. But I still wonder what would happen if we required every new structure to have solar panels, or at least every government building. “In full sun, you can safely assume about 100 watts of solar energy per square foot. If you assume 12 hours of sun per day, this equates to 438,000 watt-hours per square foot per year. Based on 27,878,400 square feet per square mile, sunlight bestows a whopping 12.2 trillion watt-hours per square mile per year.” We have yet to begin to access all the energy around us.

Of course, the biggest problem with this is someone will lose money. Someone else will make money. The energy companies, the way many stand, are losing money as solar becomes more popular. The gas companies are losing money as responsible organizations and people are divesting form them. They try to block advances that will better our environment at every turn. It really is a shame. Yet, in spite of all that, the LAPD announced today they have just bought 137 electric cars!
Finally the author I have been sharing with you form seasons of creation goes on to remind us Many of us have been conditioned to think that only humans communicate the mysteries of God. We do not expect other parts of creation to have a voice like that of humans. Butterflies do not talk. Trees do not sing the way we do. Skies do not communicate.

Psalm 19 indicates just the opposite. Many Psalms, like Ps. 148, celebrate the way trees sing, fields rejoice and the rest of creation praises God. This Psalmist invites all creation—including sea monsters and storms—to praise the Creator!

Sometimes we think this kind of talk is but poetic language, giving human voice to non-human reality. Psalm 19 suggests that the voice of creation is more than a poetic way of praising God. All creation is here communicating about—and with—the Creator.

In this Psalm the sky proclaims good news in its own way, not a human way. The sky is the mediator of God’s word. The sky announces two things—the vibrant presence of God and the creative work of God.

Unfortunately over the city of angels the sky often mourns and warns of the troubled air. The sky becomes distressful for those with conditions and young people on certain days as the particle count is just unsafe. We must listen to God in heaven, God around us, God in us, between us and remember. This is the air I breathe. This is the air we breathe. Amen.

I start this four week Season of Creation when as we explore themes on God’s Creation. We insert this into our church calendar of ordinary time and will end on Sunday October 4th with the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi and the blessing of animals. Today we will celebrate the Planet Earth.

James Lovelock, a NASA scientist, proposed the Gaia hypothesis, a compelling new way of understanding the Earth. It argues that we are far more than just the “Third Rock from the Sun,” situated precariously between freezing and burning up. His theory asserts that living organisms and their inorganic surroundings have evolved together as a single living system that greatly affects the chemistry and conditions of Earth’s surface. Lovelock proposes that living and non-living parts of the Earth form an interacting and complex system and that the Earth could be considered as single whole organism. He takes the name for Earth from the Greek goddess of the Earth, Gaia.

Earth’s living system appears to keep conditions on our planet just right for life to persist! Many other scientists are skeptical of Lovelock’s Gaia theory and dismiss it as religion, but many environmentalists take the Gaia hypothesis seriously, for his model appears ecologically sound because he sees that every Earth process and life are intimately interconnected. Over the years, Lovelock has written a number of books, making conflicting claims on the rates of climate change.

For Lovelock, Gaia, the Earth, is a single living system. Earth is alive in some sense, and we are part of the Earth. Ecologists favor Lovelock’s Gaia hypothesis because it has the individual interrelated with larger bio-systems and, in turn, related to even greater biosphere, the Earth. The Gaia theory provides a metaphorical model or a deeper ecological understanding what is happening to the Earth from the perspective of biodiversity and bio-systems. There is an interaction between inanimate processes with animate aspects of nature. And they are mutually interdependent producing a stable climate and environment for life to flourish.

The Earth is viewed as life-forming and life-sustaining system, and humanity is dependent upon this complex system of processes and animate life. What is meant by inanimate process is such elements as weather systems of the Earth, the ocean currents, the atmosphere, soil, water, mountains, and sky.

Some evangelical Christians are uncomfortable with the Gaia hypothesis and quickly charge it as form of “scientific paganism.” That indicates how far some Christians are scared of environmentalists. They are pagans, worshiping the Earth as a god. But the sad fact is that these Christians have created an apartheid with nature and the Earth. And this is a major deficit in their spirituality when an incarnate God directs our attention to what God loves. I often wonder how these Christians can so often quote John 3:16: For God so loved the world that “God sent God’s only begotten child…” God loves and values all creatures, human and other life, and the Earth herself.

Just because we envision the Earth as a living entity, we do not comprehend the Earth as divine. It mediates God’s presence, and we can discover God within nature. The Earth, all of its processes, and bio-diversity can be sacramental means for connecting to God. I have claimed consistently that God incarnates Godself in human flesh, and that means God is communicated in and through the planet Earth. The words from the Book of Job ring so true me,

But ask the animals, and they will teach you, the birds of the air, and they will tell you, ask the plants of the earth, and they will teach you, and the fish of the sea, will declare to you. (Job 12:7-8)

We experience God in and through all of nature and the Earth.
Whether the Gaia theory is hypothesis, science, or metaphor, it gives us, nonetheless, a model to comprehend the processes of the Earth and how they impact our environment, ourselves, and other life. It points out that there is one Earth in which all life originates from her processes and in which all life is interdependent. All life, including ourselves, is interconnected with each other and the planet Earth. Earth is our home and mother.

A second point, the Gaia theory insists that they we belong to a larger whole. It becomes clear that our lives are dependent upon what we do to the Earth. The poet and former President of the Czech Republic, Vaclav Havel writes,

What could change the direction today’s civilization? It is my deep conviction that the only option is a change in spirit, in the sphere of human conscience.… We must develop a new understanding of the true purpose of our existence on this Earth. Only by making such a fundamental shift will we be able to create new models of behavior and a new set of values for the planet.

Havel calls for a fundamental shift in our relationship, it is a conversion from the way we view and relate to Earth and other life.

Rachel Carson, one of my heroines–a great ecologist and fighter for the environment and life– described the ancient world of the Eastern Atlantic shore as “the intricate fabric of life by which one creature is linked with another, and ach with its surroundings.” Carson witnessed such a marvelous vision of the interconnections lie within the Earth. She was a great spiritual prophet. Listen to her words: “But I believe that the more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the world around us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.”

Spirituality begins in wonder as we become attentive to the complex processes of the Earth: the winds, weather, mountains and trees, the oceans, so much more. The gift of the Earth is also the gift of God. Some Christian ecologists consider the Earth as “God’s House.” We are living in God’s House.

But humanity is trashing God’s House. Some ecologists are saying, because of our reckless behaviors to the Earth, we are in the midst of the sixth mass extinction. 30% of other life species may become extinct by 2050. They point to the human assault on the Earth and other life, and they point to HIPPO, anagram for: Habitat destruction, Invasive species, Pollution, over Population, Overconsumption of resources. (Dyck and Ehrman) We recklessly pursue these actions without much restraint of government regulation.

When humanity separates itself from nature spiritually, we lose our capacity for wonder and being part of a larger biotic community. Our connection to the Earth expands our spiritual awareness of our connectedness to the community of life; it fosters listening, interrelatedness, and compassion. When we lose our sense of interrelatedness with nature and life, we make ourselves lords of the Earth. We harm the Earth without compassion and care for God’s creation. The prophet Jeremiah describes what happens when we separate ourselves from the Earth:

I looked on the earth, and lo, it was waste and void, and to the heavens, and they had no light. I looked on the mountains, and lo, they were quaking, and all the hills moved to and fro. I looked, and lo, there was no one at all, and all the birds of the air had fled, I looked, and lo, the fruitful

land was a desert, and all its cities were laid in ruins (Jer. 4:23-26)
This seems to be a prophetic warning of coming devastation of climate change, perhaps the sixth massive extinction.

The Gaia theory is not dissimilar to what we have done to comprehend the Earth as a whole, a living organism, and we made the living Earth, a member of our congregation. Why make the Earth a member of the Valley Church? It keeps our awareness how we are part of the web of life of the Earth. It encourages to live differently with the Earth. We see the Earth as intimately interwoven in our lives and our church. We cannot love God if we ignore our neighbor and fellow congregant the Earth. We owe the same care and pastoral attentiveness to a congregant who is suffering, oppressed, and vulnerable.

Here is a description by the by the African American pastor and human rights activist in the 20th century—Howard Thurman,

The earth beneath my feet is the great womb of which the life upon which my body depends comes in utter abundance. There is at work in the soil a mystery by which the death of one seed is reborn a thousand fold in newness in life… (It) is order, and more than order—there is brooding tenderness out of which all comes. In the contemplation of the earth I am surrounded by the love of God.

For Thurman, Earth is place we discover God’s tenderness and love as we connect t the earthiness of bodies and become re-connected to the Earth. Let me remind you that in Genesis, the poet writes “Then YHWH formed an earth creature from clods of the soil and breathed into its nostrils the breadth of the life, and the earthling became a living being.” We are metaphorically born from the Earth, and there is as Thurman so beautifully describes as a “brooding tenderness” from all life comes. As we contemplate the Earth, we are “surrounded by the love of God.”
The Earth is full of creatures, and it is important to remind ourselves that other life forms are our siblings. As I said earlier, we cannot claim to love God and ignore God’s Earth. As humans we do not own the resources of the Earth, we ideally share them responsibly and sustainably.

There is an image that I like described by Brazilian theologian Leonardo Boff. Let me read part of his Advent meditation:

Each human being is a homo viator, a walker through the paths of life. As Argentinean Native poet and singer Atahualpa Yupanqui says: “the human being is the Earth who walks.” We do not receive our existence ready-made. We must build it. And to that end, we must open the path, starting with and going beyond the paths that preceded ours, and have already been walked. Even so, our personal path is never completely given. It must be built with creativity and without fear. As the Spanish poet Antonio Machado says: “walker, there is no path; the path is made by walking.”

The poet Atahualpa Yupanqui describes us as the human being as the Earth walking. It connects to our origins as an earthling, from the soil of the Earth, and we are given life by God’s breadth of life. As the Earth walking, we have responsibilities to the Earth and the community of life.

Boff claims our real nature born from the earth as the Earth Walking enlarges our vision of the Earth and all life. It moves beyond our human tendency towards individualism, replacing it with a new vision that we live on the Earth interrelated and interrelated to a bio-diverse world and interrelated to God triune community of love. We recognize our survival and the survival of species are dependent on living responsibly and with ecological care for the entire world.
Boff’s description of us the Earth Walking recognizes that we humans are not own. We are so interconnected to Earth in our bodies and our interconnectedness to other life and the Earth. Nothing is alone, everything is part of interconnected community. Humanity apartheid from this interconnected community leads to violence, disrespect, and reckless polices of exploitation.
Through prayer we discover our compassion is rooted in the heart of God, and it becomes rooted simultaneously in meditating on the presence of God in the world. Where do we find the presence of God? It is within us and surrounds us: in our brothers and sisters and all other life, and even with the Earth. Prayer ultimately leads us to make connections with God and life. We realize that the mystery how much our incarnate God loves the Earth.
The famous astronomer Carl Sagan and Nobel Laureate in physics, Hans Bethe, wrote together to religious leaders in the 1990s:
As scientists, many of us have had profound experiences of awe and reverence before the universe. We understand what is sacred is more likely to be treated with care and respect. Our planetary home should be so treated. Efforts to safeguard and cherish the environment need to be infused with a sense of the sacred.
Scientists felt the need to remind religious folks around the sacredness of the Earth and care and reverence for the universe. We had separated ourselves into an apartheid relationship with the Earth community.

Remember: “God so loved the Earth that God sent God’s only begotten Child…”