July 26, 2009

Geno Sisneros

Preached at the Auckland Community Church

Three people look at nature – one finds mystery, one finds fate, and one finds love.

The One Who Finds Mystery Says:

Scientists listen to the calls of a male deep-sea whale for over a decade. Using deep-sea microphones they also record the changes in his voice as he matures over time. His call for a mate or a companion is sent out over and over and over again over a decade. It is never answered.

Scientists hypothesize that his call was never answered because he may have been “biologically miswired”; his call may have been transmitting on the wrong frequency. He may have been the hybrid product of two mating whales of different species making him unique and unrecognisable or undesirable. Whatever the reason, he remains a scientific mystery. I can imagine him, lonely; swimming deep in the heart of the ocean back and forth sounding his call seeking companionship for all of his life. Scientists have described this image as “hauntingly lonely”.

How do we understand a world where even one of the most basic of needs, companionship, is craved and denied to some beings?

The One Who Finds Fate Says:

Tina lays motionless, dead in the brutal sun of West Africa’s Ivory Coast. She is the victim of a leopard attack. Tina’s lifeless body is surrounded by twelve members of her community, made up of six females and six males. Tina is a chimpanzee.

Usually when a member of a chimpanzee group is injured but still alive, the others in the community will attempt to help by licking the wounds. None of Tina’s community attempts to lick her wounds though some groom her and many stay by her side for hours after her death.

Brutus, the alpha male of the community, stays by Tina’s side for five continuous hours with only a seven minute break. He chases away other chimpanzees who attempt to get close to Tina’s body while allowing Tina’s infant brother, five-year-old Tarzan to come near. Tarzan grooms Tina’s body and pulls on his dead sister’s hand gently over and over again.

How do we understand a world where some beings die brutally and the most vulnerable are left behind?

The One Who Finds Love Says:

One spring day a female goose is brought into an animal rescue centre from Pinto Lake in California with a fishhook in her leg. She is treated and when she is well enough she is allowed to swim freely in a small pool.

A few days later she is swimming in the pool when a man brings another goose into the centre, a male this time. He had been found on a busy road called Freedom Blvd. far from Pinto Lake. The man feared he would eventually be run over. Once the male goose saw the female goose in the pool he begin to honk loudly. Leaping from the man’s arms he headed straight for the pool. The female goose reacted excitedly too. Once in the pool with her, the male goose puts his neck over her and begins hissing at the staff in an attempt to keep them away. The staff believes the pair were mates and had become separated. The male had been searching for his partner from Pinto Lake to where he was eventually found all the way on Freedom Blvd.

How do we understand a world where love and chance co-exist?

Mystery, Fate & Love

At the heart of all major religions are empathy and compassion and a sense of belonging. However, we can see by the stories I’ve just told you that these are not purely human or even strictly religious qualities but are also evident in non-human nature.

Brutus the alpha male is possibly able to experience empathy and project himself into what little Tarzan must be feeling at the loss of his big sister. The lonely whale instinctively searches the deep ocean for many years for a partner. The pair of geese loses each other and by an injury and mere chance are reunited.

All these creatures illustrate to us that in nature; life and suffering are bound tightly and wound deeply together for whatever reason or no reason at all. This is the world we live in. What does this mean for us?

I remember a particularly difficult time in my life. It seemed at one point that the emotional pain and tears would never stop. Well intentioned friends all around me sometimes clumsily struggled to find the right words. Some knew their presence alone was a great comfort to me. These empathic beings nurtured and nourished me with love and helped bring about much needed healing. Some of them used beautiful metaphors to assure me that this too would pass.

One friend reminded me that through the tears everything looks different, notice how through your tears the light bends and blurs dramatically. Shapes and colours are transformed.

Another friend told me about Yellowstone National Park in the 1980’s where one-third of the park was devastated by wildfires. People hadn’t realised that not only is it natural for lightning to cause the forest to burn but it is also healthy. The scarred earth brings forth new life and attracts new species. Suppressing the fires reduces dramatically the number and variety of animal and plant life that are attracted to an area. Yellowstone now allows most natural fires to burn because of the healthy benefits to the earth. The burning forest was of course a metaphor for the broken heart.

That all suffering comes to an end is a sure sign of a merciful creation, a merciful Creator. One who transforms us and has gifted us with the power of compassion and empathy. One who transforms us through the awesome power of love.

I’ve learned a great deal from all of the metaphors that come out of our natural world. From lonely whales to romantic geese, our living earth has much to teach us about community and belonging. Nature can be seen as a reflection of the human heart, the human condition. To me this is not evidence of a fallen humanity but of an incomplete one. Creation is ongoing. Creation is happening right now.

And now I find it impossible to say that my life is blessed or that I am blessed. To say I am blessed means that an all-loving god shows favour to some and not to others and that is an absurdity. Why should my life be blessed any more than a child on the African continent who is starving? To look at our natural world and see divine favour in it is to see a distorted reality. That doesn’t mean that a living God isn’t present, it means that God relies on us as social, relational, self-conscious and loving beings to help bring about the Kingdom here on earth.

If God is on any side, it is always the side of the suffering. Our responsibility to each other and to all beings is to relieve suffering where we are able to. That is how we are truly blessed, that is where our power truly lies, and that’s what love truly is.

Three people looked at nature – one found mystery, one found fate, and one found love. I pray you find all three.

And finally, like Paul’s prayer to the Ephesians, I pray also; “that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” (Ephesians 3:18-19) Amen.