October 2009 EVENTS

* Integral Spirit

Saturdays, October 3, 10, 17, and 24 from 9:00am to 12:30pm

Story House, in the forest at Whidbey Institute at Chinook

This short course with Fritz Hull, Whidbey Institute Founding Director, invites you to work with personal spiritual life in the context of the Universe/Earth story, the environmental imperative and our own desires for creative involvement in the world.  You will explore with others a spirituality that is experienced as inclusive, free, radiant, creative, ever-present to the beauty and mystery of life and able to generate the practices of sustainable living.  Primary resources are Thomas Berry, Mary Oliver, Ken Wilber, Brian Swimme, and Duane Elgin.  Provocative and inspiring, the course includes presentation, reflective discussion, integrative assignments…and always an affirming spirit.  It will introduce you to the new work at Story House and Legacy Forest and offer a broad range of resources and connections.  The course fee is $100.  For more information and registration email: info@whidbeyinstitute.org.

2009 Quaker Earthcare Witness Annual Gathering

Friday, October 9 to Sunday, October 12

The Firs Conference Center, 4605 Cable Street, Bellingham, WA 

The 2009 Quaker Earthcare Witness Annual Gathering kicks off Friday evening with a keynote address by Kathy Hyzy, editor of Western Friend, a magazine by and about Quakers in the West. The agenda for Saturday includes presentations by numerous religious and environmental leaders, many of whom are active in Friends meetings around the country. Sunday will feature a worship service and an old-growth forest field trip. Earth Ministry will have a presence at this national creation-care gathering. For more information and registration see http://quakerearthcare.org/MeetingsandEvents (click on Fall Meeting and Annual Gathering).

*Connecting for Compassionate Action

Saturday, October 17, 8:30am - 5pm

Fisher Pavilion at the Seattle Center, 305 Harrison Street, Seattle, WA

You're invited to attend an Open Space event with the Compassionate Action Network (CAN), Seeds of Compassion, and Bellingham Compassion Movement. The Dalai Lama Center for Peace & Education from Vancouver B.C. will also participate in the event.

The program is organized around the following question:  "How shall we connect to accelerate compassionate action in ourselves, our region, and the world?"  Bring your gifts to the circle, convene and attend sessions that answer the "calling question" within the framework of community inquiry and exploration.

Participants will:

. Engage with people and organizations that share common goals.
. Discover practical and proven actions for awakening compassion in education, environment, economics, peace, social justice, youth, and/or other areas.
. Share community engagement strategies.
. Recommend steps to build a local, regional, and global network.
. Enjoy music, art, dance, stories, and food.

There will be a $10 suggested donation to help cover event costs.  Everyone is welcome regardless of one's ability to pay.  To RSVP, please email Jon Ramer at jramer@interraproject.org or call (206) 526-2323.

* Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations

Sunday, October 18, 11:30am - 1pm

Calvin Lounge, First Presbyterian Church, 2936 Rockefeller Ave, Everett, WA

Come and meet the author of Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations! Macarthur Fellow David R. Montgomery studies geomorphology, the evolution of landscapes.  He graduated from Stanford University with a B.S. in geology and from U.C. Berkeley with a Ph.D in geomorphology.  He is a professor in the Development of Earth & Space Sciences at the University of Washington.  His research interests range from the co-evolution of the Pacific salmon and the topography of the Pacific Northwest to the environmental history of Puget Sound rivers, interactions among climate, tectonics, and erosion in shaping mountain ranges, giant glacial floods in eastern Tibet and northeastern India, Martian geomorphology, and the role of agricultural soil erosion in the longevity of human societies.  He has published over 200 papers in the scientific literature and is the author of both Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations and King of Fish: The Thousand-Year Run of Salmon.

*Earth Ministry Gathering: Food, Climate Change, and the Church

Saturday, October 24th, 9:30am - 1:00pm

Ballard First Lutheran Church, 2006 NW 65th St, Seattle, WA

We are pleased to invite colleagues and members alike to a 350.org event that seeks to integrate the urgency of climate change with the inspiration and mobilization of faith communities. The program will begin at 9:30am and conclude with a potluck lunch at 12 noon.

With this event, we will introduce Earth Ministry's "Caring for All Creation: At the Table." Using this great resource as a platform, we will explore the link between climate change and our food production, transportation and consumption. Effective change comes through collaboration and cooperation, so we will conclude our program by asking our Greening Congregations Colleagues to share their own great work-- challenges and concerns as well as successes and hopes-- with one another and all of us in dialogue.

Afterward, please join us for our potluck lunch and bring your favorite food or drink produced within 350 miles of Seattle, WA: local salmon from Pike's Place Market, apples from eastern Washington, Walla Walla or Willamette wines, a fresh salad made from your personal garden's bounty-- feel free to be creative! We look forward to celebrating and supporting sustainable change with you. For more information, please contact Clare at clare@earthministry.org or 206-632-2426.

* Honoring Our Ancestors: An Art & Movement Retreat for All Saints

Thursday, October 29- Sunday, November 1

St. Andrew’s Retreat House on the Hood Canal, Union, WA

The Christian feasts of All Saints and All Souls honor the profound legacy of wisdom our ancestors have left to us. These feasts coincide with the Celtic feast of Samhain which marks the beginning of the dark half of the year and is a festival of the final harvest and remembering the dead. These moments on the great turning of the year’s wheel is believed to be a “thin place” where the ancestors are especially accessible to us.

Join facilitators Betsey Beckman MM, and Christine Valters Paintner PhD, for three nights of retreat welcoming in the gifts of the dark time and honoring our ancestors through creativity and movement. Ritual, poetry, art-making, song, and dance will be our tools to grow in awareness of those who walked the earth before us and to listen for the wisdom they offer to our own life circumstances. We will explore the gift of our genetic and spiritual roots and celebrate the coming of the fruitful darkness when the seeds of new beginnings are planted. Gather with us to welcome in the presence of the Communion of Saints who support us in each moment. Together we will honor this very sacred time of year. There are early registration discounts before September 20. Visit www.AbbeyoftheArts.com and click on teaching for more information or email Christine at Christine@AbbeyoftheArts.com.

---------------------------------------

Visit Earth Ministry’s website: www.earthministry.org