91热爆

A spiritual comment and prayer to start the day with Baroness Julia Neuberger, Rabbi of West London Synagogue

Good morning.

I was in south west Ireland over New Year, and as we enjoyed sunshine, crisp blue skies, and surprisingly dry weather, Australia was suffering appalling bush fires, Delhi had dense smog, and there were floods in parts of the UK and elsewhere. Reading news reports of floods and fires, the word 鈥楤iblical鈥� or sometimes 鈥榚pic鈥� jumped from the page, referencing Noah鈥檚 Ark and the flood from the book of Genesis or the even earlier flood stories from the Babylonian epic of Gilgamesh. 鈥楴atural disasters鈥�, we call them, yet increasingly we know we contribute to them. 鈥楪od鈥檚 punishment of wicked humanity鈥�, except floods and fires are not selective in who gets injured or killed.

Noah was apparently saved, along with his family and pairs of all the animals and birds, because he was the most righteous man of his generation. The Bible doesn鈥檛 say he was genuinely righteous- he was good by comparison with the rest, but they weren鈥檛 up to much! Yet some people are genuinely righteous- and remind us of our obligations. This New Year we鈥檝e been hearing from Greta Thunberg, an amazing young woman, whilst evidence is mounting that young people are suffering stress and depression because of climate change.

As climate change climbs up the political agenda, we need to ask whether it is climbing higher in our personal agendas too. Are we ready to think about how we live, work and play in the light of our effect on the climate? Recent months have been a wake-up call. Traditionally, we Jews have said a blessing on seeing a new tree or a new plant, a thankyou to God for biodiversity.

But maybe now there is another prayer to be said, for all of us: 鈥淢ay God make us more aware of how we affect the planet we inhabit, and more generous in how we treat it.鈥�