DAY 3

Image Source

Oceans and Plastic: 3

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A Greeting
Turn, O God, save my life;
deliver me for the sake of your steadfast love.
(Psalm 6:4)

A Reading
God scatters the snow like birds flying down,
and its descent is like locusts alighting.
The eye is dazzled by the beauty of its whiteness,
and the mind is amazed as it falls.
God pours frost over the earth like salt,
and icicles form like pointed thorns.
The cold north wind blows,
and ice freezes on the water;
it settles on every pool of water,
and the water puts it on like a breastplate.
(Sirach 43:17b-20)

Music



Meditative Verse
From whose womb did the ice come forth,
and who has given birth to the hoarfrost of heaven? 
(Job 38:29)

A Poem Prayer
With wide-embracing love
They spirit animates eternal years
Pervades and broods above,
Changes, sustains, dissolves, creates and rears

Though Earth and moon were gone
And suns and universes ceased to be
And thou wert left along
Every Existence would exist in thee

There is not room for Death
Nor atom that his might could render void
Since thou are Being and Breath
And what thou are may never be destroyed.
- by Emily Bronte
found in The Flowering of the Soul: A Book of Prayers by Women
ed. by Lucinda Vardey

Verse for the Day
We will never turn back from you;
give us life, and we will call on your name.
(Psalm 80:18)

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Microplastics embedded in sea ice found in the Arctic.
(PhysOrg)

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In the past two days, we have seen how plastic is finding its way into our oceans, and can be found even at the very bottom of the sea. This third and last day of Oceans and Plastic explores the plastic that is embedded in Arctic sea ice and the unwanted changes wreaked on the Arctic by global warming. The image immediately above is a sheet of Arctic sea ice gathered by scientists, which shows entrapped particles of microplastics. It was found deep inside an ice block. (Source) Sampling from five different Arctic regions, these scientists found approximately twelve thousand bits of microplastic — per litre of ice, making Arctic sea ice many times more a repository for plastic garbage than even the Pacific gyres that were mentioned yesterday. Andrea Sparrow is a photographer and videographer with the Arctic Arts Project, a group of visual arts communicators who, working with scientists and educators, make “immersive” visual art that is both beautiful and informative about climate change in the Arctic. In the video below, Sparrow narrates what she herself witnessed on a field expedition in Greenland while a series of images that she and others captured, unfolds visually. “We simply don’t have time to make slow changes to our way of life,” says Sparrow. These deeply unsettling words challenge us in every possible way, even as we are awestruck by the beauty of the images that Sparrow and others captured. How can it be possible that such catastrophic reality lies embedded in such a wondrously beautiful place? In today’s reading, we hear the Wisdom writer Sirach describing the birth of Creation, and in particular God’s formation of winter elements. He too uses vivid imagery to capture our imagination. “From whose womb did the ice come forth?,” asks Job referring to God in a whole chapter of rapturous wonder at Creation. In Psalm 139, the psalmist tells us that each of us, also, was formed in the womb of the earth. All of these biblical writers are reminding us that when we seek God's help, we are returning to the origin of our being, and no request is too great. How does this motivate us today? How can we be comforted by knowing that God is present with us as we move to make change?

A CREATIVE PROJECT
This video was prepared as a presentation for a conference of the
International Union for the Conservation of Nature in August, 2019.
Note: mobile users may need to tap several times to make video play.

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