Cosmic Walk - Clergy Retreat 2022

Bishop
Let us pray for the revealing of the reign of God in the world, now and always:
In the beginning, God was.
Here and now, God is.
In the future, God will be.  

Reader
We acknowledge that this land is the unceded, ancestral land of the Pomo peoples. Their presence is imbued in the land surrounding us. May we nurture our relationship with our Native neighbors, and the shared responsibilities to their homelands where we all reside today.
Enable us to be good caretakers and stewards. May we enrich the earth and be enriched by it.  

Gong

Reader
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The Word was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through the Word, and without the Word not one thing came into being. What has come into being in the Word was life, and the life was the light of all people. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not overcome it.

Gong

Reader (bowl with candles is uncovered)
Fourteen billion years ago, from that place that was no-place, from that time that was no-time, God calls forth the cosmos in a silent blaze of inconceivable brilliance. It contains all the light, energy, and potential for everything that will ever come to be.

Gong

Reader (walker begins first section)
Eight and a half billion years later, our Grandmother Star becomes a supernova. She gives up her life in an explosion that gives rise to our Star, what we call the Sun.  The sun and a great disk of matter emerge—all the members of our solar system.

Gong

Reader
For the next three hundred million years, Earth sweeps up solar system debris, swelling in size. Some of the outer layers of the molten Earth splash out into orbit, creating the moon.

Gong

Reader
Over the next six hundred million years, as Earth's surface quiets and cools, an atmosphere begins to form. The first rains fall upon the Earth, and oceans emerge.

Gong

Reader
Four billion years ago, oceans bring forth the wonder of life – simple cells. Earth comes alive.

Gong

Reader
Five hundred million years ago, the first animals and plants move out of the waters onto the dry land, separating themselves from the creatures that remained in the waters of the oceans.

Gong

Reader
Three hundred million years ago, continents converge, and ancestral mountains are uplifted. All the land is locked within a single land mass.

Gong

Reader
Two hundred and ten million years ago, the continents shift, crack, and drift apart.  Separate oceans are formed. Creation on earth expands and moves apart.

Gong

Reader
Six hundred and fifty thousand years ago, the plates that form the San Andreas fault began their dance. Shifting and sliding, squeezing and spreading, slipping and stretching they created the San Francisco Bay and the foothills that surround us.

Gong

Reader
One hundred and forty thousand years ago, modern Homo Sapiens emerge in the unfolding life process. Through the human, the universe realizes its capacity for conscious self-awareness.

Gong

Reader
Twenty-six hundred years ago, the stories that would later become the oldest part of the Bible are first written down by people seeking God.

Gong

Reader
Two thousand years ago, a woman named Mary gives birth to a child, Jesus, called Emmanuel, “God with us.” His struggle to embody, teach and share God's love inspires followers who later became known as Christians.

Gong

Reader
Four hundred and forty-three years ago, Sir Francis Drake and the crew of the Golden Hinde mark their arrival with the first Anglican worship service on this coast of the north American continent. Human greed, selfishness, and the desire for “progress” led us to displace and enslave the gentle native people to serve selfish interests strengthened by their desire to dominate the land and claim it for a foreign power.

Gong

Reader
Two hundred and fifty-three years ago, Missionaries from Spain, led by Junípero Serra, began to make their way up the coast of California planting outposts that would become some of our largest cities. These missions contribute to the devastation of the traditional way of life for the people who had been living on this land for thousands of years.

Gong

Reader
One hundred and seventy-three years ago, Gold is discovered in California.  Human greed and selfishness begin to damage the creation we were given. The poisons from the mining process continue to pollute the San Francisco Bay.

Gong

Reader
One hundred and sixty-nine years ago, missionary William Kip became the first Bishop of the new Diocese of California, which included all of what is now the state of California. He rode across this state, preaching, teaching, baptizing and blessing.

Gong

Reader
Ninety-three years ago, Astronomers observe the expansion of the Universe. Humans learn we live on the outskirts of a continually developing Universe.

Gong

Reader
Seventy-five years ago, the land and first buildings of this Ranch was sold by Aileen & Osborne White, to the Diocese of California, fulfilling a dream of then Bishop Karl Morgan Block.

Gong

Reader
Thirty-two years ago, human beings looked from outer space and saw the entirety of Earth, a pale blue dot in the darkness of space. And on that pale blue dot every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician and public servant, every saint and sinner in the history of our species live there—on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.

Gong

Reader
Today, the Story of the Universe is being told as our Sacred Story.  The Flaring Forth continues at this moment.  Today, all humans can know the story of our origin, Our shared story with all creation living in this sacred Universe. 

Bishop
Holy God, you alone are unutterable,
from the time you created all things that can be spoken of.
You alone are unknowable,
from the time you created all things that can be known.
All things cry out about you: those that speak, and those that cannot speak.
All things honor you: those that think, and those that cannot think.
For there is one longing, one groaning, which all things have for you.
All things pray to you that comprehend your plan and offer you a silent hymn.
In you, the One, all things abide,
and all things endlessly run to you who are the end of all. Amen.