The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe, the less taste we shall have for destruction.
~ Rachel Carson
Photo by TAO Photography, used with permission
Devadana Sanctuary
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We cannot assume the sacredness nor spiritual livingness of the earth or accept it as a new ideology or as a sentimentally pleasing idea We must allow it to shape us, as great spiritual ideas have always shaped those who entertain them…The spirituality of the earth is more than a slogan. It is an invitation to initiation, to the death of what we have been and the birth of something new.
~ David Spangler
Wailua Falls, Kauai – photo by Don Smith Photography, used with permission
We are a part of the Earth and it is through her great generosity that we are nurtured and nourished, eating her food, drinking her waters, clothed in her fabric. Even as we deplete her, she continues to give and give. Her generosity is a lesson for us all. Each morning on my walk I pass a gnarled old apple tree. I watch her boughs become heavy with fruit, slowly reddening as late summer turns to fall. I marvel at how she gives with such abundance without wanting anything in return. Now, in this “season of giving,” if we can remember the constant stream of gifts we receive from her, and be appreciative in our hearts.
~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee
Photo by Zastrozzi Dh Photography, used with permission
Every walk to the woods is a religious rite,
every bath in the stream is a saving ordinance.
Communion service is at all hours,
and the bread and wine are from
the heart and marrow of Mother Earth.
~John Burroughs
Central Park Tree People, photo by Devadana Sanctuary
To enter fully the day, the hour, the moment
whether it appears as life or death, whether
we catch it on the inbreath or outbreath,
requires only a moment, this moment.
~ Stephen Levine
Mt. Hood on the Horizon, photo by KR Backwoods Photography, used with permission
Without our conscious cooperation the future will not be born in its full potential. We are the book in which the knowledge of oneness is being written.
~Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee
Sol Duc River – photo by TAO Photography, used with permission
Life is lifes greatest gift. Guard the life of another creature as you would your own because it is your own. On lifes scale of values, the smallest is no less precious to the creature who owns it than the largest.
~ Lloyd Biggle Jr.
Ruby Beach, photo by KR Backwoods Photography, used with permission
Water flows over these hands. May I use them skillfully to preserve our precious planet.
~Thich Nhat Hanh
Photo by KR Backwoods Photography, used with permission
The way we live and act is determined by the perceptual lenses that are shaped by our beliefs and values. Our belief that it is our right to use as we wish, any part of the biosphere – air, water, soil, other life forms – has created problem after problem. If life is sacred, then we cannot treat other organisms as if they are cars or computers, we must act with humility, respect and love.
~ David Suzuki
Yosemite – photo by Don Smith Photography, used with permission
The world I want to see is where we use technology to enhance our relationship with ourselves. We are nature, and we are ecology. Ecology is the interrelationship between all living things. We are living things.
~ Mileece
Beneath Bridalveil Fall – photo by Gary Hart Photography, used with permission
I know nature speaks to us if we listen. Every animal has a story to tell. Every flower blossoms with reminders to be creative, and every tree whispers with its rustling leaves the secrets of life.
~ Ted Andrews, “Animal Speak”
Photo by TAO Photography, used with permissio
…Whether you call the light in nature the Great Spirit or the Anima Mundi,( the World Soul) it is the same – it is this living divine principle within creation. And I am convinced that we can not solve the problems in the world, the ecological problems for example, without invoking this light, this magic, this wisdom, this knowledge – this PRESENCE within nature.
~ Llewellyn Vaughan-Lee
Northern Lights – Mt. Baker, photo by Mirwais Azami Photography, used with permission
But is it not ludicrous to address the world directly, to speak to other organisms and elements as though they could understand? Certainly not, if such is the simplest way to open our ears toward those others, compelling us to listen, with all our senses, for the reply of the things. To be sure, the valleys and the oaks do not speak in words. But neither do humans speak only in words. We speak with our whole bodies, deploying a language of gesture, tone, and rhythm that animates all our discourse.
~ David Abram, “Between the Body and the Breathing Earth”
Tatoosh Ridge, photo by KR Backwoos Photography, used with permission
We seldom notice how each day is a holy place
Where the eucharist of the ordinary happens,
Transforming our broken fragments
Into an eternal continuity that keeps us.
Somewhere in us a dignity presides
That is more gracious than the smallness
That fuels us with fear and force,
A dignity that trusts the form a day takes.
So at the end of this day, we give thanks
For being betrothed to the unknown
And for the secret work
Through which the mind of the day
And wisdom of the soul become one.
~ John O’Donohue – “The Inner History of a Day”
Mother Tree, Chester, CT – photo by Devadana Sanctuary
…I always find it strange that somehow we are very keen on working with ourselves as a sacred being but we do not realize that this sacred being that is ourselves is part of a much bigger sacred being that is the world, that is creation.
~ Llewelly Vaughn-Lee
Heavenly Fire, Milky Way and the Kilauea Caldera, Hawaii – photo by Gary Hart Photography, used with permission
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