The World in Communion
I grew up in Taiwan, as the daughter of Presbyterian missionaries… of parents who believed in service… of faithful Christians who understood that the verse said, “For God so loved the World…”. And they spent their years of service sharing that love.
I never heard a word of condemnation against others of other beliefs. My parents didn’t agree with them, religiously, and urged them to be Christians, but they understood that we live in God’s creation, on God’s earth, bound together, and that love between us and on behalf of all of us was the key.
PCUSA Peacemaking Offering Quilt
World Communion Sunday, the first Sunday in October, was always special to us, far away from U.S. family and friends, surrounded by our Taiwanese community… a time to remember that the source of the invitation to be part of the Whole didn’t and doesn’t come from us, but from the Creator… that around the globe, filling the globe, are people just trying to live and love and care for their families and their neighbors… that we are all called to be caretakers of this earthly creation instructed to our care, and caretakers of each other..
And then I watch the news… and there is war and violence and hatred and greed and power-hungry lies and pretense of truth, but yet, tucked in the cracks, there is unselfish caring for the least of these, and I cling for survival to those glimpses in the midst of all the abuse.
When did we forget that the earth is a planet of power in the wind and the water and the shaking of the earth, and that we are fleeting passers-by on this spinning sphere, only a spec in the whole universe?
When did we start pretending that when we destroy the air we are hurting nothing… that our actions do not hurt all of us humans and also all living creatures… that the air and the land and the sea are not interconnected and interdependent?
When did we start standing greedily tall, acclaiming that we can do anything anywhere to anybody just because we have the money or the will to do so, whether or not it is good for the least of these?
World Communion Sunday is an annual reminder. We are One. We are human. We have a responsibility to each other and this earth. If we don’t care for each other globally, there is no one else to do it. If we don’t care for this earth as its stewards, not its abusers, there is no one else to do it.
Let us hold each other close on this day, World-wide, in repentance for where we have each failed, and in renewed commitment to respond to the gift of Life with global commitment to serve on behalf of the least of these, our brothers and sisters everywhere. Let the hurricane strength of wind and water be a fresh wake-up call to our interdependence.
- Sarah
Please join us and also share on your social media.
Donate here to the ongoing work of the CDCA with the poor in Nicaragua:
https://donatenow.networkforgood.org/jhc-cdca