The Religious Campaign for Wilderness
Western North Carolina Advisory Statement
The Spiritual Values of the
Lost Cove-Harper Creek Wild Area
A Christian Reflection
from an Exploration of a
Proposed Wilderness Area
Boone, NC
October 9-12, 2003
* 887 Sebastopol Road, Suite A *
Santa Rosa, California 95407
* tel. (707) 573-3161 *
Western North Carolina Advisory Statement
Introduction
§0.1 During the Spring of 2003, Appalachian
Voices, a coalition of environmental organizations in Boone, North Carolina,
invited the Opening the Book of Nature (OBN) Christian ministry to explore
and identify the spiritual values of the Lost Cove - Harper Creek area of
Western North Carolina.
§0.2 To answer this invitation, representatives
of the OBN program, together with representatives from North Carolina churches,
gathered in the Lost Cove-Harper Creek area during the weekend of October
9-12, 2003. Amidst the lavish red, orange and gold colors of fall, we visited
this wilderness area, hiked its trails, spent time in prayer and reflection,
held discussions on our insights, and finally, on the basis of common insights
regarding our experiences, we reached unanimous agreement on a beginning statement
on the spiritual values and implications of this wilderness area.
§0.3 The findings from our group reflection
follow. You are invited to examine and comment upon our insights. We encourage
your feedback.
§0.4 You are especially invited to
join with us on October 7-9, 2004, as we again enter into extended reflection
on the spiritual values of the Lost Cove-Harper Creek area. As this process
has deepened us in our Christian walk, so we invite you to “come and see.”
Join us that weekend for a time of discussion and inspiration. You may be
surprised to find how prayer and reflection when coupled with wilderness produce
a more vigorous form of discipleship, regardless of one’s church or background.
§0.5 With this background, we invite
you to enter into this experience so that together, we might better appreciate
the benefits of wild areas for the enlargement of our faith. At the same time
we also hope to better appreciate the path of our Lord who benefitted from
time in wilderness (Matt. 5:16).
§0.6 Signed by
§0.7 Key NC individuals
Western North Carolina Advisory Statement
Dedication
§0.8 “O Lord, Our Lord, How majestic is
Your name in all the earth!
You
have set your glory above the heavens” (Psalm 8:1).
§0.9 O God, thank you for Your wilderness
and
for the many blessings which pour forth
from
Your untrammeled creation.
§0.10 In wild places, You speak, even to
me,
just
as You did with our Lord and the prophets and saints of old,
and
You give me hope
through
the renewal which You reveal in wilderness.
§0.11 As I pray in this wild place
with
its rushing stream and brilliant colors,
perhaps
I glimpse something of the world as You created it.
§0.12 And here I know that You call on me
to
protect and preserve what remains of wilderness,
to
nurture and expand it,
to
see my own renewal in the wild.
§0.13 You have made us to have dominion
over all your works,
You
have put all things under our feet.
§0.14 O Lord, help us to be faithful to
this lofty commission.
Help
us to steward this gift of Your beautiful creation.
§0.15 To Your glory, let this be.
This
is our prayer.
Amen
Western North Carolina Advisory Statement
The Spiritual Values of Wilderness
§1.0 As we have sought to discern the spiritual
values of the Lost Cove-Harper Creek wild area, we have encountered so much
inspiration and blessing that we are mentally and spiritually overwhelmed
at how abundant is God’s witness in creation when approached in a prayerful
and reflective manner.
§1.1 The following are some of the
beginning insights which our reflections and discussion have revealed:
1. Spiritual Revival is Inherent in Wilderness
§1.3 Wilderness has its own worship of the Creator.
By its very nature it offers a quiet but exuberant praise of God which humans
should acknowledge. This natural worship gives wilderness inherent worth,
presence and value that stretches beyond its potential monetary values as
commodities or raw materials.
§1.4 When visitors to wilderness feel
the presence of pines and plants,
streams and rivers, earth and soil, sunlight and shadows,
they connect to an aspect of the cosmos that elicits wonder, admiration and
ultimately humility before the great work of our Creator-God.
§1.5 Millions of people visit wilderness places for hunting, fishing and
recreation, but there is a more significant possibility, a re-creation, a
spiritual renewal, which becomes possible when wilderness is entered for expressly
religious purposes. Wilderness can then open and impart its unique teaching
– a great uninhibited flow of spirit and life which nurtures and vivifies
even our own lives, an inspired wisdom formed by the very process of creation.
This enhances, even revives our sense of God who is everywhere present and
fills all things.
§1.6 In this way we find in wild nature
a reminder of God’s presence within creation, a recollection of how the life
in our own bodies is intertwined with the life of all other living things.
As Christians, the Lord of this life is the Lord Jesus Christ through whom
we find connection, even a unity, with the life of creation.
2. Teacher, Healer and Prophet
§2.1 Wilderness is an intact, untrammeled expression of God’s creative
action. Thus it imparts aspects of His divine nature.
§2.2 Inherent in this nature are its
derivative functions of teacher, healer and prophetic vision.
§2.3 As teacher, wilderness is inspiring, beautiful and manifesting
of wisdom; it is also stern, just and uncompromising.
§2.4 As flowers are obedient to their
natures, so wilderness everywhere teaches obedience to its Maker and each
part demonstrates fidelity to its purpose. This is a lesson which human society
has not yet learned.
§2.5 As healer, wilderness is recreative, regenerative and spiritually
uplifting when approached with respect, reverence and a search for God. Every
one of us needs healing.
§2.6 When the therapeutic values of
wild nature are understood, wilderness becomes medicine for wounded souls
and stressed minds, a prescription written by the wisdom of our Maker for
the strains and tensions of modern life.
§2.7 As prophetic vision, wilderness reveals the eternal power and
divine nature of the Creator. At the same time it models the integrity and
harmony of the created order as a witness for human society.
§2.8 Experience in wilderness encourages
us to leave the profit motive and return to the prophet mode. The more we
intuit its prophetic nature, the more we also develop humility and gratefulness.
§2.9 Therefore we see the witness of wilderness as a great prophetic lesson
for human society: its display of submission to divine principle and the integration
of its designs into the biophysical systems of the planet provide a test for
the suitability, sustainability and integrity of human action. The prophetic
lesson is that human actions and development must enhance and complement the
already existing systems of nature or they should not be carried out. This
witness of wilderness offers guidance for human actions and ensures that a
complementary, integrative quality informs all human development and growth.
§2.10 Despite all of these magnificent features
and miraculous functions, wilderness is still fragile and vulnerable. It requires
love and intentional care to preserve and protect it as well as recognition
that it can be wounded and even destroyed by careless or thoughtless human
action.
3. A Geography of Hope
§3.1 Wilderness is a revelation of the Logos. Wilderness is also an intact
system of spirit and life, designed by the creative wisdom of God. This “witness
of the cosmos” gives us an ability to face our own mortality and to shape
our own lives with consideration of their consequences upon the future.
§3.2 Wilderness imbues us with a sense of
the virtues, evoking faith, hope and charity and the righteousness which we
repeatedly learn from Scripture as well as from our own inner life.
§3.3 Wilderness provides a framework for faith. It makes the presence
of God more palpable and so affirms a sense of His nearness. Just as Jesus
often withdrew into the wilderness to pray (Luke 5:16), so all Christians
can benefit from following this blessed example. Our own prayers find a particularly
unimpeded connection to God in wilderness.
§3.4 The very existence of wild lands reminds
us that the world yet retains vestiges of its primeval purity. This beckons
us into our own forms of purity in imitation of the image and likeness in
which we have been created. In this way the existence of wilderness can serve
as “a geography of hope,” even a beacon for the possibility of purity.
§3.5 Wilderness hides her lessons from anger or greed or prideful disdain,
but she reveals them to those who love God and who will love what He has created.
Wilderness thus elicits a natural form of charity; she encourages an opening
of the heart and mind in vulnerability to our Lord and Saviour that He might
impart the deeper glories of His majesty while we are yet immersed in our
worldly sojourn.
§3.6 Faith, hope and charity, therefore,
are among the many witnesses of wilderness. When these are set alongside the
thanksgiving, humility and submission of our lives as disciples of Christ,
we can relearn an old lesson which Early Christians knew well: that wilderness
becomes “a geography of virtue,” a form of religious teaching which deepens
our discipleship.
4. Wilderness as Tithe
§4.1 Creation is the context of our lives and the framework for our journey
of discipleship. It is a gift from God that He has given to us to steward
and to have dominion over in a way that requires justice, prudence, temperance
and holiness.
§4.2 Yet wilderness is fast disappearing.
Less than 0.3% of North Carolina’s once magnificent forests and mountains
has been set aside for future generations to experience and enjoy. If we are
to rightly steward and take dominion over this land, if we are to leave creation’s
full evangelical witness intact for the future, wilderness must be a continuing
legacy which we will pass on to future generations so that they, too, may
benefit from the natural lessons of our Creator without defilement or without
elements missing from its grand and eloquent commentary.
§4.3 Wilderness has unseen dimensions.
Just as plants have roots which are underground, so there is more to the unseen
in wilderness than to the seen. Wilderness is an untainted embodiment of the
essential mystery of being; it reflects the timelessness of its Creator and
the depth of its Maker. Wilderness may even hold answers to questions we have
not yet learned to ask. To degrade or destroy it before it can impart the
witness of its Unseen Maker is irresponsible and the height of folly.
§4.4 We are inspired, therefore, to invite
the churches of North Carolina to reflect on wilderness as a social tithe,
as a setting aside of the first and best of what ultimately belongs to God.
In this way, future generations may also enjoy the beauty and good in God’s
undefiled creation. From a religious perspective, wilderness protection becomes
a free will donation that we owe to God in thanksgiving for His many blessings
in our lives and upon our planet.
§4.5 Wilderness is also our religious acknowledgment of a responsibility
to leave some of the best of the land intact so that future generations may
experience the world of their forefathers as it was originally created by
God.
§4.6 For these reasons, and more not listed
here, we ask you, as representatives of Christ’s continuing ministry, to consider
the following recommendations:
Recommendations
§5.1 After spending time in the Lost Cove-Harper Creek wilderness
and arriving at the insights which we list above, plus many other insights
not listed here, we invite you to consider the following recommendations:
§5.2 — Visit the Lost Cove-Harper
Creek area.
Come with an intentional seeking of its spiritual side. Come with a search
for God and for spiritual learning. Come with prayer and thanksgiving.
§5.3 — Speak out on the spiritual
values of wilderness.
Religion has a long legacy of going into wilderness for spiritual reasons.
Let us not ignore this dimension of the Biblical tradition.
§5.4 — Take action to preserve and
protect this wild area.
North Carolina has few top quality candidates for wilderness status, and
the Lost Cove-Harper Creek area is one of the last best places remaining.
§5.5 — Invite churches and clergy
into a discussion on the spiritual values of wilderness.
What are they? Why are they religiously significant? What is their value
for congregations today? Let us save this wild area it while it is still pristine
and able to be preserved for the future.
§5.6 — Reflect on our responsibility
to future generations.
Look especially at the need for wilderness protection. Will our children’s
children thank us and bless us for how we have left the land, or will they
curse our stupidity and selfishness in silencing its potential witness? What
do we owe the generations that will come after us?
§5.7 Please distribute these recommendations
regarding North Carolina’s last best wild areas to your clergy and religious
leaders. Every person owes a thanks to God for the goodness of the world,
and this includes saving of the last of the best for future generations.
Thank you.
Motivation and Conclusion
§6.1 The foregoing reflections and recommendations
are but a small beginning, a scratching of the great wealth and riches which
wilderness brings to our faith and our nation.
§6.2 We come from many denominations and
traditions. We are Baptists and Anabaptists; Presbyterians and Pentecostals;
Roman Catholics and Evangelicals; Methodists and Episcopalians; Seventh-Day
Adventists, Eastern Orthodox, and Lutherans.
Despite our theological diversity, we are unanimous in a firm conviction
that creation, and especially wild creation, provides an inspired witness
that benefits all of our churches and all of our society.
§6.3 Therefore, we submit these recommendations to you,
first that our religious traditions might be strengthened and reinvigorated
to fulfill the biblical mandates to love God, to love our neighbor, and to
care for the Lord’s good earth, and second, that the small
amount of wilderness which still remains in North Carolina might be protected,
preserved and enlarged.
§6.4 For all these reasons, we encourage
every church into a deeper examination of the potential for wilderness to
offer a religious witness complementary to every manifestation of the Way
and the Truth of our Lord Jesus Christ.
North Carolina Advisory Statement on
the Lost Cove-Harper Creek Proposed Wilderness Area
Endorsements
§7.1 I
have read the foregoing statement and wish to support its message and its
call for North Carolina to protect the Lost Cove-Harper Creek wild area and
its other remaining wilderness lands. This is our prayer.
§7.2 Signatures
from Endorsees
§7.3 Please
sign your full name, the church, synagogue or other institution with which
you are associated (for identification purposes), plus the town or city where
you live. Thank you.
§7.4 ____________________________
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