Peace with Creation Starts Here

There are times when my world seems neatly divided into two camps: those who know what Season of Creation is and enthusiastically observe it every year and those who give me a blank stare when I say “Season of Creation”. If you’re in the former camp, I need your help. Keep reading. If you’re in the latter camp, keep reading. 

The Season of Creation has its origins in the Orthodox church beginning in 1989. In that year, the Ecumenical Patriarch declared September 1st to be a day of prayer for Creation. The World Council of Churches extended the celebration from September 1st to October 4th, the Feast Day of St. Francis of Assisi. Since that time, Christians from around the world have used that time to reconnect with God by reconnecting with God’s Creation. The hope is that Christians all over the world would begin to embrace this as an annual celebration. 

Over the years, the celebration of the season has led to new prayers and hymns being written, while also recognizing the richness of Creation-centered liturgy that has existed since the Church’s early days. In this time we recognize the living world both as our teacher and as our responsibility. Some have even taken to creating a special lectionary for the season to draw attention to the ways that Creation appears in Scripture and encouraging preachers to highlight ecological concerns from the pulpit. 
This is all well and good but…

Do we really need another liturgical season? 

As a former pastor, I know the kind of work that goes into leading a community of faith through our liturgical calendar. There is a pressure, particularly around Advent and Lent, to help people to have a spiritually meaningful experience of those seasons. And for some of us, the need to recognize that there are more than two liturgical seasons is an uphill climb that often feels futile.  (Christmas and Easter are seasons!!!!) So the idea of adding another observance to the life of the church may feel like an unneeded burden. 

And yet at their best, liturgical seasons draw our attention to what is happening in Creation. Advent coincides with shorter days and the need to find light in the darkness. Lent parallels the coming of Spring as new life enters the world. The Season of Creation coincides with late summer harvests, gradually falling summer temperatures, and the coming of autumn. For many, this is Creation at its best! 

But perhaps more importantly, our liturgical seasons are times of rededication to our faith, periodic reminders of where our spiritual energies should go. This year, we celebrate the Season of Creation on the heels of a summer of record-breaking heat and humidity and as hurricanes begin to gather in the warming oceans. We enter this season as the science on greenhouse gases that has guided us for decades is being refuted at the highest levels of government. We enter this season shortly after the United States stood in opposition to a plastics treaty that would have been a significant move toward ending global plastic pollution. 

 
In light of all of this, it feels fitting to rededicate ourselves to a faith that sees the beauty in all that God has created. It feels like the right time to reassert the belief that the vulnerable should not have to bear the climate burden that the powerful have created. It feels critical that this Season of Creation be a time when we purposefully declare that God’s world is worthy of our service and protection. This year, the global Season of Creation community chose “Peace with Creation” as a guiding theme and in a time where the natural world seems to be under assault, there is no better time to proclaim that we desire a new sense of harmony with the world that God has made. 

Throughout this season, Creation Justice Ministries will be organizing Public Witness for Creation events. We will hold these in D.C., Grand Rapids, Michigan, Atlanta, Georgia, and  Phoenix, Arizona. These areas were chosen because of their specific environmental justice issues and their legislative importance. These public witness events are a way for us to live out the command of Christ that we not hide our light, but that we instead “let [our] light shine before others so that they may see our good works and give glory to our God in heaven” (Matt. 5:16). In these dark times, it’s crucial that we show that there is a better way of living in harmony with the world God made in love. 

So, if you are a church that has been celebrating the Season of Creation for years, we hope that your celebrations this year will be bright and loud for all of your neighbors to see and hear!  We’d love to know how you are celebrating this year. Feel free to send us your pictures and stories at [email protected]. 

And if you are new to the Season of Creation, I hope that you will make space in worship in the coming weeks to recognize the goodness of Creation in your prayers, hymns, and maybe even in your preaching. 

While every season is the Season of Creation at Creation Justice Ministries, we are thankful for the special time to join with Christians around the globe to observe a time of praise, lament, confession, and celebration on behalf of God’s beloved world. We hope that you’ll join us in making God’s love for Creation visible for the whole world to see. 

Derrick Weston 
Director of Theological Education and Formation 
​Creation Justice Ministries​