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“For you love all things that exist
and detest none of the things that you have made,
for you would not have formed anything if you had hated it.”

– Wisdom 11:24

On a recent Monday, two friends, both professing Christians, posted two different pictures, each representing their outrage.

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The first image was a screen cap of a message my friend sent to our state representative regarding the importance of keeping health supplies for menstruating humans in library bathrooms. The other post was by a friend who came across a tree covered in giant version of a common bug, which freaked her out. She used words like “horror” and “disgusting” when describing the encounter.

Coming across both of these images within moments of each other got me thinking.

In the first instance, my friend was conveying her outrage – rooted in her Christian faith, a faith that informs her belief that all humans are worthy of dignity, respect, and love – over the ongoing direct and indirect inhumane aggressions against Transgender humans by both federal and local government agencies. She spoke from her core Christian value that all humans are intrinsically made and loved by God.

In the second instance, another friend expressed disgust and fear at coming across a new-to-her insects. Insects that looked extremely different from the version she was used to, but insects who are also intrinsically made and loved by God.

Reading these posts back to back, it occurred to me that there might be a connection.

Is there a connection between calling a giant bug gross and denying Trans humans basic health supplies?

In 2014 when we moved to Preservation Acres, our little farm in Arkansas, I made a conscious effort to become more comfortable with crawling, stinging, and flying creatures of all kinds. Since I had chosen to move to their homeland,I decided to work on seeing these creatures as my siblings instead of my enemies. I figured that since I was the invader and domesticator of their wild habitat, it was my job to be a humble, open learner, and a good guest.

I was the interloper, not them. They were simply being who they were created to be – creepers, crawlers, fliers, stingers, and inches.

I believed it was my duty, as the one holding the greater position of power – at least in terms of size- to use my position of power for the good of the whole instead of just for myself. I believed that caring for the “least of these” with great intention was, in fact, part of my Christian duty on the farm.

In the years since we left Preservation Acres, I have lived on two more farms in two more states and have subsequently met an even wider variety of slugs, bugs, moths, and their kindred. When it is possible and safe, I do my best to either live alongside them in peace or rehome them to a more hospitable location outside the four walls of my house. Even when it isn’t possible or safe, I am acutely aware that I am using the inherent power and privilege of being human to end the life of a living being.

Like many other Christian traditions, we make promises and vows in the Episcopal church when we are baptised. These promises are the scaffolding on which we are meant to build our life as Jesus-followers. They are meant to inform all of our decisions, words, and actions. We make these promises at baptism (or in the case of infant baptism, they are made on our behalf), and then we renew these promises each year thereafter as a reminder of our commitment to God, ourselves, and each other. We renew these vows as a reminder of what it means to live as a member of the Body of Christ on this earth.

Most of these promises focus on our relationship with God, our neighbors, and ourselves, which is all fine and good. And. It’s not the whole story. We humans are not the only living organisms on this planet. Nor are we the only ones God cares about. And so, a few years ago, after years of work by theologians, creation care advocates, and regular church members, our governing body, General Convention, approved additional language to be used during the sacrament of Baptism.

Here are the promises we make, with the new language in bold:

Will you continue in the apostles’ teaching and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in the prayers?
I will, with God’s help.
Will you persevere in resisting evil, and, whenever you fall into sin, repent and return to the Lord?
I will, with God’s help.
Will you proclaim by word and example the Good News of God in Christ?
I will, with God’s help.
Will you seek and serve Christ in all persons, loving your neighbor as yourself?
I will, with God’s help.
“Will you strive for justice and peace among all people, and respect
the dignity of the Earth and every human being?”;
I will with God’s help.
Will you cherish the wondrous works of God, and protect the beauty and integrity of
all creation?
I will with God’s help.

– from the Service for Baptism

With the addition of these promises, our Christian commitment to love and care for all that God loves and cares for is explicitly spelled out. The focus of our Christian journey is expanded beyond just our human needs and human cares. Now, our Christian identity and responsibilities are placed within the broader framework of creation, and we are challenged to think about how our actions and attitudes impact all of creation, not just the human experience.

In her book, Come Have Breakfast: Meditations on God and the Earth, Elizabeth A. Johnson sites verses like Pslam 104:24 and 50:10-11 as examples of how “the personal pronouns ‘yours’ and ‘mine’ convey the spiritual sense that the dynamic presence of the Creator undergirds, enfolds, and bears up the natural world, it’s processes and it’s creatures at every moment.” In other words,

O Lord, how manifold are your works!
    In wisdom you have made them all;
    the earth is full of your creatures. – Psalm 104:24

For every wild animal of the forest is mine,
    the cattle on a thousand hills.
I know all the birds of the air,
    and all that moves in the field is mine. – Psalm 50:10-11

Johnson shows us that God cares about, for, and always watches over all of creation. The flourishing of all of creation matters to God. Not just the flourishing of humans. Not just the flourishing of cute fluffy polar bears and beautiful and majestic Eagles, or the small and expected caterpillars.

This brings me back to those two posts a few Mondays ago.

Reading those posts back to back, I couldn’t help but wonder. Does the inclination of so many humans, especially those professing to be Christians, to be hateful and dismissive of our Transgender neighbors stem from the same place that allows or encourages us to declare an unusual insect to be “gross” ?

Does the ease at which we squash bugs and declare particular created four and six-legged beings to be “gross” contribute to the ease at which we sneer or laugh at our Trans siblings? Does our lack of care about what plastics are doing to our soil and water contribute to the ease at which we dismiss the care of those whose medical needs differ from ours? Does our determination to build a world that is convenient and easy for the majority of the Western world, despite the changes it causes to migration patterns and the health of chickens, lead to the kind of contempt and arrogance that refuses to honor the name and pronouns our neighbors choose for themselves?

And who taught us that bugs are gross anyway? Who taught us to be scared of grasshoppers and to stomp on ants? Who taught us to mock and squash what God has made?

I grew up in a Christian tradition that very much viewed the earth and all of creation as “ours” instead of God’s. The attitude was to use it up and throw it out because earth was only a temporary stopping point on the journey back to Heaven. The posture was that of domination over stewardship, ownership of over co-creating and caring with God. It was a posture that placed Christian humans within that belief system above all other created beings – including the soil, the oceans, caterpillars, and yes, even other humans.

It is a posture that reflects and informs a culture rooted in the pursuit of self-interest and taking versus the pursuit of the common good and giving.

And yet there is nothing in scripture that leads me to believe that God says “ew gross” when gazing upon any of God’s creations – human, insect or otherwise.

Instead, I find a Creator who loves the soil, the earthworm, the hammerhead shark, the sycamore tree, and each fearfully and wonderfully made human. Instead of a bully who squashes and mocks, I find a Creator calling each of them by name, calling each of them good.

It is us, not God, who calls God’s beloved creation “gross”. And until we begin to see all of creation as beloved and ourselves as learners, caretakers, and co-sojourners alongside – and not above-  creation, we will continue to sin against God and our neighbor, enabling a culture where it is okay to pollute the air and harm Trans siblings.

This coming Wednesday is Ash Wednesday, and we will begin the liturgical season of Lent.

Lent is a time for repentance, fasting, and charitable giving.

Maybe this Lent we could repent of our use of words such as “gross” and “disgusting” when speaking of God’s creation.

Maybe we could fast from bug squashing and silence in the face of injustices against any of God’s creation.

Maybe during Lent, if we see a bug in our houses, we could think of honoring its dignity as a created being and rehome it instead of killing it. And maybe the next time we hear someone make fun of a Trans person’s appearance or refuse to call someone by their chosen pronouns, we can honor the intrinsic belovedness of our Trans neighbor and speak up for their dignity.

Maybe we could donate funds, time, and prayer to organizations working for Creation Justice and Transgender Care. Maybe we could learn about their work and how we can support them -not just in Lent, but for all times.

And maybe, just maybe, by doing these things, we will begin to align our actions and words with the teachings of Jesus a little more closely, learning to love as God loves just a little bit more, helping the world will become a little bit more like the Kingdom of God and a little less like the Kingdom of Us.

*Sallie McFague, Body of God