Dear friends,
Shalom! I am happy to greet you as the first Jewish member of Earth Ministry’s Board of Directors.
In the Jewish tradition, we recently passed through the High Holiday season, which is concerned with reflecting on the holiness of creation and our place within it. We celebrated Rosh Hashanah as the birthday of the world and Yom Kippur as the day of atonement, the culmination of a process through which we work to repair our relationships with one another and with G-d. Finally, Sukkot brought us into a tangible space of joy at the intersection of vulnerability and resilience, which we experience through our connections with community and the world that nurtures us.
It is increasingly obvious to me and to many Jews that we must elevate our relationship with the “more than human world” into our liturgy and observance of these holidays, and hold it with equal importance among the relationships we treasure and work to elevate.
The faithful advocacy and high-impact of Earth Ministry’s talented staff strengthens the work of my Jewish advocacy group’s efforts to engage with this sacred work. Our voice is stronger when we unite, and more consistent when we have organizational support of volunteer efforts. We all benefit from the courage and inspiration that come from walking this path together. This is why I have eagerly linked the advocacy of Ahavat v’Avodat HaAdamah (Love and Service of the Earth) with Earth Ministry.
Personally, I am glad to make a meaningful financial contribution to help sustain and grow Earth Ministry’s faithful advocacy and transition into a multifaith organization. I hope that you and your faith community will join me in supporting the good work of Earth Ministry/Washington Interfaith Power & Light.
Despite the COVID-19 pandemic, which has forced the world to shift to an online format, I have witnessed the Earth Ministry team effectively carrying on our shared work for environmental justice.
One of the things that I most love about Earth Ministry’s approach is that we prioritize standing with the Indigenous communities whose lives and lifeways are bound up with the lands and waters of this place that we all call home. Earth Ministry approaches these relationships with humility, knowing that Native voices are the elder voices, teaching us how to be in relationship with each other and all creation.
Following tribal leadership, Earth Ministry is holding the “thin green line” against the expansion of fossil fuel infrastructure on the West Coast, which is critical to stopping the combustion of fossil fuels here and in Asia, slowing climate change, and creating a just transition to a clean energy economy.
We continue to support the Puyallup Tribe in opposing the construction of a polluting fracked gas facility on the Tacoma Tideflats, adjacent to the Tribe’s land and waters. Earth Ministry is also speaking out against the world’s largest fracked-gas-to-methanol refinery proposed for construction along the Columbia River in Kalama, WA. This facility would turn dirty and dangerous fracked gas into the raw material for cheap plastic, and in the process would use more gas than all of the Northwest’s biggest cities combined.
In addition, Earth Ministry is advocating for a federal-level effort to restore the health of the salmon-producing ecosystem of the Salish Sea, working closely with Lummi Nation on recovering orcas and with the Nimiipuu (Nez Perce) on restoring climate-warmed rivers and endangered salmon runs in Eastern Washington. Along with our years–long battle against toxic pollution in Puget Sound, this work is critical to restoring abundant life and health to the waterways that epitomize and sustain our region.
Earth Ministry depends on your financial support to continue this sacred work.
Please join me in making a donation today!
Looking ahead, there is a little-known mitzvah, or commandment, in the Hebrew Bible which connects us to the land. Shmita, also called the Year of Release or the Sabbath of the Land, commands us to let the land rest every seven years and forgive all debts.
With the Great Pause of 2020 brought about by the global pandemic, we have seen many seeds of Shmita sown around the world, as normal economic activity ground to a devastating and unplanned halt. A quiet ocean heard whale song that had been drowned out for decades by vessel noise. Clear skies gave an urban generation in India a glimpse of its gorgeous birthright of a horizon studded with stars by night and snowcapped mountains by day. Farmers delivered food to the hungry for free rather than let it rot in the fields, and beaches empty of tourists teemed with wildlife.
We have also seen economic inequality deeply exacerbated and laid bare by the pandemic. Those who were able holed up in their comfortable and secure homes and had necessities delivered to their doorstep by “essential workers,” who, for low pay and in the face of tremendous economic insecurity, bore and continue to bear the brunt of the risk from the still rampant disease.
How might Shmita show us how to live better on the Earth? How can it teach us to lift the burdens on people who are deemed essential but are simultaneously profoundly exploited by our economic system?
The next Shmita begins a year from now, in 5782 in the Hebrew calendar. Over the next year, Earth Ministry/ WAIPL will plant and tend the seeds of Shmita’s concept of rest and release. We will work together to transform our society into one that is just and sustainable for all. I’m excited about the possibilities that abound, and hope you are too.
I invite you to support this powerful work of justice and community by making a gift to Earth Ministry.
L’Shalom,
Deirdre Gabbay
Earth Ministry Board Member
PS: Please join me in supporting Earth Ministry/WAIPL! Click here to make your donation online. Thank you!