Death insists that life is real, and during a pandemic our mortality as creatures insists that we are all the same – human.

The presence of death is creation’s voice rising in the absence of God. Out of the ground we arose as God spoke. Somewhere between heaven and earth, humanity began.

We are connected to the earth and long for the voice of the one who said rise and walk.

Creation travails under the weight of humanity’s immorality, humanity’s abuse of all that God has made.

 To repent is to forgive, to forgive is to restore, to create is to be merciful in a world where mercy is thought to be a weakness.

 We have forgotten that the earth is the Lord’s and thought we could parcel it out as though we were gods, take from the earth without care for life, but creation speaks, and her voice rages in force like a courageous mother defending her children from monsters who consume goodness. We are all her children. We are all God’s children.