One: Morning has broken! Many: We gather to greet the new day by praising God. One: God created us for relationship with God, one another, and the earth. Many: Let us honour those relationships today and every day. One: We seek to care for our brothers and sisters around the world and to God’s good Creation. Many: Let us honour those relationships today and every day. One: May we commit to new ways of honoring your Creation as a means of sharing Jesus’ transforming love, Many: And let us seek God’s grace, justice, and mercy for all. All: Amen.
Opening Song
“Come, Sing the Plenteous Power of God” Sister Grove Collective
Come sing the plenteous power of God alive in humankind to hold and heal to seek and save to leave our wars behind to join with all creation now, a partnership of love to tend the handiwork of God in whom we live and move.
Come sing the power that lets us weep to see what greed has done to rob and harm our fragile earth, our home beneath the sun to join with people everywhere and dare to change our ways To save what can be saved of earth in these most crucial days
Come sing the timeless realm of God while human empires fall come join with folk around this world who here creation’s call to tend with deep humility, that dares not blame or boast this tiny earth so full of life, our home or Hope our host.
Opening Prayer
Rae Guthrie
Madrenuestra Yolanda Arroyo Pizarro, translated by Lawrence Schimel
Our Mother who art in Infinity Hallowed be thy names, thy pronouns, the elles, the todes, the X and the @, thy anti-sexist kingdom come unto us, and thy feminist will be done on Earth as it is in the Body and in the Street as it is in our heaven-bed Give us this day our daily Seed the fruit of our Earth and Sea, the water of our cascades. And forgive us our errors, canned venom, bottled water, plastic, disloyal monogamy, ethic-less polyamory, ill-intentioned religion, class oppression and the other horrors of capitalism, just as we forgive ourselves our self-imposed chains and lack of solidarity; let us not fall into misogyny, toxic masculinity, homophobia, racism, hate crimes, xenophobia, white supremacy, fanaticism, femicides, in short, deliver us, Our Mother, from operating with evil. Aménashé.
Scripture Reading
Abi Harper
Romans 8:19-23 “For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; and not only the creation, but we, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.”
Leader: The Word of God for the people of God. All: Thanks be to God.
Anthem
“Problem & Solution” By the Sister Grove Collective
Seminary Choir
Collective Reflections
Ben Yosua-Davis, Drew Theo Alum and Director of Applied Research at the BTS Center
Rae Guthrie
Sacrament of Holy Communion
Rev. Adrian Mendoza (Communion Stewards: Renessta Olds-Haigler and Takundanashe Chinogwenya)
The Great Thanksgiving: The Lord be with you. And also with you. Lift up your hearts. We lift them up to the Lord. Let us give thanks to the Lord our God and our Creator. It is right to give our thanks and praise. It is right and a good and joyful thing that we give thanks to you, O Creator, who formed the earth and called it good, who breathed life into dust, who planted the garden and invited us to tend and keep it. With gratitude, we join the whole Earth in proclaiming your goodness, the harmony of your creation, and the hope that your justice will reign. And so, with all the prophets and saints, and all the company of heaven, with the forests and the oceans, with the creatures that crawl and the winds that howl, we join in the unending hymn of creation: 🎶 Holy, Holy, Holy Lord, God of power and might, Heaven and Earth are full of your glory. Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is the One who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. Holy are you, and blessed is your Son Jesus Christ. By the baptism of His suffering, death, and resurrection, You gave birth to Your Church, delivered us from slavery to sin and death, and made with us a new covenant by water and the Spirit. On the night of betrayal, Jesus gathered those He loved, took bread from the earth, gave thanks to you, broke it, and gave it to His disciples, saying: “Take, eat; this is my body, broken for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” When the supper was over, Jesus lifted the cup filled with the fruit of the vine, gave thanks to you, shared it to his disciples, and said: “Drink from this, all of you; this is my blood of the new covenant, poured out for you and for many for the forgiveness of sins. Do this, as often as you drink it, in remembrance of me.” 🎶 ALL: Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again. Pour out your Spirit upon us, O God, and breathe upon these gifts of bread and wine. May they be for us the body and blood of Christ. As we partake, may we become more deeply connected to the Earth, to one another, and to the sacred call to live with justice, compassion, and reverence for all of creation. Empower us to be agents of renewal, transforming brokenness into wholeness, division into unity, and despair into hope, as we labor for the restoration of the Earth and the flourishing of all life. Through your Son Jesus Christ, with the Holy Spirit in your holy Church, all honor and glory is yours, almighty God, now and forever. 🎶 ALL: Amen.
The table of the Lord is for all! Here, the body of Christ is broken for you and the blood of Christ, poured out for you. Come, all who are weary from the weight of injustice and creation’s groaning. Come, all who seek the sacred in soil and sky, river and tree, breath and body. Come to this table, where God’s love for all creation is made known in the gift of the body and blood of Christ.
Songs During Communion “We Need a Revolution”
“Join the Trees In Praise” By the Sister Grove Collective Refrain We are a part of the world Not the center of it We are a part of the world Not apart from it Not apart from it
God give humility and creativity To join the trees in praise JOIN THE TREES IN PRAISE
Bridge Our children come after us They must live with what we leave Our children come after us They will share this air we breathe
Refrain
Coda Jesus of the redwood trees Jesus of the bumblebees Heal us, help us heal the earth
Jesus of the mountain high Jesus of the soaring sky Heal us, help us heal the earth
Jesus of the ocean deep Jesus of the coral reef Heal us, help us heal the earth
Jesus of the mighty gale Jesus of the humpback whale (Heal us, help us heal the earth 3x)
We are a part of the world Not the center of it We are a part of the world Not apart from it Not apart from it
God give humility and creativity To join the trees in praise JOIN THE TREES IN PRAISE!
Prayer After Communion ALL: Creator of us all, you have met us in this meal, fed us with your presence, and strengthened us for the journey ahead. As we go, may we be empowered by your Spirit, to be the presence of Christ in a wounded yet resilient world, to serve the Earth and all its inhabitants, bringing forth the hope of restoration and renewal for all creation. Amen.
Silent Video
Blessing
Lerato Pitso
Announcements
Takundanashe Chinogwenya and Albarka Wakili Joanne Rinaldi Brashier, Grants Manager/House of Worship Liaison, Interfaith Food Pantry Network
Sending Song
“The Life That’s in Me” The Okee Dokee Brothers
The Life That’s in You Have you ever heard the way that the trees Talk to one another through the soil and the breeze Have you felt the light under the ground Weaving the earth to life all around Rain grows the grass, grass feeds the heard The heard feeds the plant and the plant feeds the bird The bird drops the seeds, the seeds grow the trees The trees give the air, the air that we breathe
You and I are just one part Of one big life with one beating heart (‘cause)
Refrain The life that’s in you is the life that’s in me And the life in a bird – is the life in a tree And if we can believe – in one thing that’s true It’s the life that’s in me – is the life that’s in you
If we listened to the forest we’d hear that it spoke And there’s a message blowin’ through the maple and oak That if we try to pick something out by itself We’ll find it’s connected to everything else
The plant and the animal, the predator and prey The prairie and the fire, the night and the day Love and grief, life and death Are all bound together by the very same breath –
Refrain The life that’s in you is the life that’s in me And the life in a bird – is the life in a tree And if we can believe – in one thing that’s true It’s the life that’s in me – is the life that’s in you
Drew Theo Chapel 