A Lesson from the Gulf Oil Spill: We Are All Connected (and There Is No Escape)

Katharine Jefferts Schori's career as an oceanographer and university lecturer (a B.S. degree in biology from Stanford University, an M.S. and Ph.D. in oceanography from Oregon State University) preceded her studies for the priesthood (an M.Div. from Church Divinity School of the Pacific) and her election as bishop of Nevada in 2000. Since June 2006 she has been the presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church.

She writes recently in the Huffington Post

"The original peoples of the North American continent understand that we are all connected, and that harm to one part of the sacred circle of life harms the whole. Scientists, both the ecological and physical sorts, know the same reality, expressed in different terms. The Abrahamic traditions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) also charge human beings with care for the whole of creation, because it is God's good gift to humanity. Another way of saying this is that we are all connected and there is no escape; our common future depends on how we care for the rest of the natural world, not just the square feet of soil we may call "our own." We breathe the same air, our food comes from the same ground and seas, and the water we have to share cycles through the same airshed, watershed, and terra firma.

"The still-unfolding disaster in the Gulf of Mexico is good evidence of the interconnectedness of the whole."

To read the full article go to Huffington Post.