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March 28, 2024
Dear friends,
This Holy Week began here in Southern Maine with a devastating ice storm. We awoke on Palm Sunday morning to majestic trees brought down, limbs strewn across streets and yards and cars, and widespread power outages. There was an eerie beauty, too, in the way in which the ice captured and illuminated so many small details that often go unnoticed — and we were forced to slow down as our "normal" way of functioning was disrupted. Once again, we can see the ways in which climate change is impacting the particularities of our watershed and the effects, large and small, on the human and other-than-human inhabitants. The disruptions may look different in your area, but we know no being is left untouched.
As those of us who claim a Christian identities enter today into the Easter Triduum ("three days" — Holy Thursday through Easter Sunday, during which we recall Jesus' suffering, crucifixion, burial, and resurrection), we are reminded of the destruction that Empire can bring and of all the ways in which that is manifesting in our world today. As we honor the journey through life and death — and back into life — that Jesus undertook, we embrace the complicated hope that blooms in the crevices of destruction. We root into this earth so that we may rise in community with one another to meet the challenges of living and loving in a climate-changed world.
This spring, we at The BTS Center would love to welcome you into one or more of the programs we're offering. We're looking forward to a book study on the thoughtful work of T. Wilson Dickinson — Singing the Psalms with My Son: Praying and Parenting for a Healed Planet, starting in May. And also in May, we'll be hosting our first Green Teams Gathering, in person in Cape Elizabeth, Maine. If you're within reach of Southern Maine and are involved (or would like to be) in congregational climate work, this in-person offering might be for you!
Summer brings an opportunity for congregations to join us for our Claiming Your Call for a Climate-Changed World retreat at the beautiful Schoodic Institute in Winter Harbor, Maine. We hope your congregational team will consider applying — the deadline of April 10 is coming up soon! (Decisions will be announced on May 1.) For the young people in your life, we're thrilled to offer our first Climate Justice Camp for teens in partnership with Pilgrim Lodge in West Gardiner, Maine in July.
We wish you gentleness and companionship as you ride your own waves this season.
With best wishes,
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