Patricia Tull’s Horizons Bible Study
Let Justice Roll Down: God’s call to care for neighbors and all creation
Lesson 5: Air Quality
From an infant’s first breath to our last sigh, the ability to breathe is essential to life. It is miraculous that our planet has the right balance of nitrogen, oxygen, argon, carbon dioxide and other trace gasses. Earth’s atmosphere is 21% oxygen, and humans need air that is at least 19.5% oxygen. The chances of finding another planet with breathable air are low.
The ancient Hebrews did not know the makeup of our atmosphere. Biblically, however, ours is a God-breathed world.
“When God began to create the heavens and the earth, the earth was complete chaos, and darkness covered the face of the deep, while a wind (ruah) from God swept over the face of the waters” (Genesis 1:1-2).
Other translations tell us the Spirit – ruah, which can mean spirit, breath and wind – of God moved over the waters. Couldn’t this be written as “the breath of God moved over the waters?”
God’s Wind/Breath/Spirit animates and enlivens, and because breath comes from God, it can be considered sacred. In Genesis 2, God forms a person, the earth creature, and breathes into the person the breath of life. God gives the breath of life to all creatures. The Spirit of God envelopes, lays hold of and descends on prophets and on Jesus at his baptism, enabling the Word of God to be preached. In Ezekiel 37, God breathes into dry bones and they begin to don tissue, veins, hair, muscles. In Acts 2, a wind fills the room where female and male disciples are praying, and they begin to speak in many languages about Jesus.
This breath prayer builds on the understanding that God’s Spirit/Breath/Wind breathes the world into life:
Take a deep breath and breathe in God.
Exhale all that separates you from God.
Breathe slowly. Try this six times in secession.
In writing this article, I looked up the air quality in Richmond, Virginia. In the morning, higher and unhealthy levels of nitrogen dioxide, which comes from fertilizer manufacturing and car emissions, filled the air. In the summers, air quality alerts let us know when it is difficult to breathe outside.
Air pollution can be invisible, but it exacerbates asthma and can be deadly. And air pollution can travel. Airborne lead is related to learning disabilities and reduced IQ. Odorless, invisible carbon monoxide kills. Sulfur dioxide produces acid rain, which kills plants and animals. Wherever petro-chemicals are manufactured, there are higher levels of cancer. Poor communities are exposed to more air pollution. “In the U.S., communities of color and low-income neighborhoods are exposed to 28% more nitrogen dioxide (NO2) — a major component of traffic pollution — than higher-income and primarily white communities,” according to the Mom’s Clean Air Force website.
Pushed by the wind, acid can be in fog, rain, snow, hail and dust. I remember seeing trees hit by acid rain in the Appalachian Mountains. They had lost their summer foliage and looked ashen.
How can you help? Visit the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)’s website, and learn how to become an Earth Care Congregation. Plant trees in urban heat deserts. Use a city’s bus service, or carpool to work.
In Let Justice Roll Down, Patricia Tull mentions four organizations working to protect our air and land: The Southern Environmental Law Center (SELC) is “the largest nonprofit, nonpartisan environmental legal advocacy organization rooted in and focused on the South.” According to the SELC’s website, the organization helped expand access to solar power, cleaned up 270 million tons of coal ash, and secured the largest power plant clean up in history.
Mom’s Clean Air Force, Earth Justice and the Sierra Club all work to protect our environment.
This is a God-breathed earth. Let’s protect it so everyone has clean air to breathe.
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