Our North Pacific Yearly Meeting Faith and Practice section on Harmony with Creation begins:
“The mystery and beauty of the universe reveal their Source. Spiritually and physically nourished by our home, the Earth, we are filled with gratitude and wonder.”
Being filled with gratitude and wonder is a start, but where does that good feeling carry us?
In November of 2021, Francisco Burgos, Pendle Hill’s Executive Director, posted an article On Practicing Gratitude:
“Let us visualize practicing gratitude as a well-crafted testimony of our intentions and aspirations. This is something that can have a strong impact on our individual selves as well as in our society. On a personal level, for example, when we are grateful for the gifts that others have given or shared with us, we create space for better relationships based on mutual support and care. This is also an opportunity for confronting our limitations and for setting the stage for change.”
Burgos is speaking of testimony in the accepted Quaker meaning of the word: a public profession of religious experience and understanding of the truth. Testimony refers to our spiritual leadings to action. Our Testimonies are where Spirit and Action come together.
I propose that we each consider adopting a Testimony of Daily Gratitude for the Earth that does what Burgos describes: Creates space for a better relationship with all of Nature, based on mutual care; we acknowledge all that Nature does for us and match it with our actions that benefit the Earth. This is not a just a passive thanksgiving or feeling of gratitude, but something richer, that propels us into new habits of reciprocity.
Francisco Burgos advises:
“…gratitude must move us to examine, celebrate, and transform ourselves. I invite you to connect with the inward force that sustains us and to manifest it outwardly by practicing gratitude. This is a courageous act in which we challenge ourselves to creatively explore our life experiences in the company of others.”
My Thanksgiving prayer: May we nurture a deep, compelling testimony of gratitude for all of nature and use it to sustain a great wellspring of love and energy that propels us into witness and action for the earth.
My testimony of gratitude has to do with gardening. As I approach 80, I thought I was all done with a vegetable garden. How wrong I was. I can still bend over and plant and crawl on my knees and thus still able to eat the chard and the kale and the spinach, freshly picked from our garden. Such immense gratitude in this moment!
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