A spiritual challenge

The Rev Richard Frazer urges readers to ‘consider the lilies’ and nature’s circular economy in meeting the challenges of humanity’s restlessness.

JESUS pointed to the beauty of the created order.

“Not even King Solomon in his finest robes could compare with the beauty of that flower”, says Jesus as he points to the lilies of the field. He was addressing people who were anxious about having enough.

We all know in our hearts that it is an illusion to imagine that having more stuff leads to fulfilment. In truth, the more we have, the more anxious we are likely to become. The desire for more has been a constant battle in my life as I try to remind myself I have enough already.

In the Hebrew Bible, we read of the Curse of Cain. He slays his brother and as punishment is forever destined to be a restless wanderer on the earth. “When you work the ground, it will no longer yield its crops for you”.

Cain’s is the story of humanity. Restlessness has led us to wander the earth, anxious that the place we live will not yield enough. Migration may be at the top of the political agenda just now, but it goes back to the very beginning of humanity. We are all the children of people on the move, hoping that the land we occupy will provide us with what we think we need.

Jesus speaks of a flower that does not labour or sow, but is arrayed in great beauty. I wonder if he was answering the Curse of Cain. In a world that has finite resources, we cannot go on using everything up. Our restless wandering has led to loss of habitat and species and the desolation of large parts of the earth. The Climate Emergency is the result of human anxiety. It is time to consider an alternative to the cultivation of needs and embrace a less anxious vision. There is much to learn from nature and from the Gospel.

Economists and politicians tell us urgently that economic growth is vital. It is rhetoric echoing Cain’s anxiety. There comes a point, however, when we reach limits to growth and human demands on the earth exceed its capacity to provide for us.

We should “consider the lilies”. Nature does not use everything up, but creates a circular ‘economy’. The beauty of the flower is possible due to a different way of being. Is there “a more excellent way?” I believe there is.

Ecologists speak of the science we already possess that could solve the Climate Crisis. However, as many scientists have said, science is silent on the question of human anxiety that is using everything up. We face a spiritual challenge as our current way of living is threatening to sweep us all away.

In his letter to the Corinthians, St Paul writes: “We have wronged no-one, ruined no-one, we have not taken more than our fair share” (II Corinthians 7:2). Can we say that is true of how we live our lives?

“ The desire for more has been a constant battle in my life as I try to remind myself I have enough already.

As the church is preoccupied with selfpreservation, there is a risk we forget that the Gospel we proclaim holds the key to human and planetary flourishing. It is about justice for all and an invitation to view the wisdom of nature’s way revealed in the beauty of the lily. It thrives in a way entirely at odds with human anxiety about having enough.

E F Schumacher the visionary economist wrote: “Any activity which fails to recognise a self-limiting principle is of the Devil.” For the rest of my days I will go on trying to tell the world, and myself, that far from being an irrelevance, the message of the Gospel contains the deep wisdom for survival the world so desperately needs to hear.