Our Creator God is not remote, but is intimately entangled with the whole of creation and intimately entwined lovingly with everyone and everything in it, writes Good Samaritan Sister Jacinta Shailer.
In my opinion, one of the very great things that is happening in the 20th and 21st centuries is the growth of ‘consciousness’, which is spreading throughout our global earth. I have noticed this consciousness expand rapidly in the past 40 or so years of my life. We can thank science and the worldwide growth in technology.
Every day, science is telling us of our expanding universe. I remember in 1988 when I was studying in the US that people were beginning to think that there was another galaxy besides our own Milky Way.
Now we know that there are two trillion galaxies. These galaxies average an estimated 100 million stars. They range in size from dwarf galaxies with less than 1000 stars, to the largest galaxies called supergiants with 100 trillion stars.
Not only that, but the universe is also expanding every second and the farther away from the centre, the faster the expanding. We know that in every second, new life is coming to birth.
Today’s scientists tell us that nearly 14 billion years ago, the Big Hot Cosmic Bang took place from something, maybe as small as a pin head. Imagine, if you can, that something of that size held the potential for this whole magnificent universe in which we live.
The marvellous thing that is happening, as we become aware of this mind-boggling, ever-evolving creation in which we live, is that our understanding of the Ultimate Mystery that initiated it all has, for us, expanded beyond measure as well.
For 96 per cent of humanity’s time on earth, humans thought that the universe was flat, that below was a big deep, and above there was just a wall of stars. Many of our early voyagers thought that as they sailed towards the horizon, they would be in danger of tipping off.
With this understanding of earth, many people thought that God who created it all lived up above the wall of stars and was very remote. With our new consciousness emerging, we realise that our Creator God is not remote, but is intimately entangled with the whole of creation and intimately entwined lovingly with everyone and everything in it, with every atom, every wave of energy, in this vast, complex and magnificent universe in which we have the privilege of living. Not only that, this Evolutionary God is not old, but is ever young and ever new, and is calling us each day to a future of new life, even after death.
This is a universe that cares for us each second of the day and night, so deserves to be nurtured and cared for by us in return. As our consciousness of this world increases, we understand with an ever-deepening clarity our interdependence and interconnectivity with every creature, every particle of growth, every human, every atom in this universe.
We also know with increasing concern that many do not understand our inter-connectivity and are harming this planet on which we live. In some ways, Christianity might have to take some of the blame. It comes from a misunderstanding of the Genesis story. Some Bibles give the impression that humans were given “dominion” over all creatures, instead of God’s true meaning, which was “to take care of” the earth and its creatures.
Some Christian preachers have told their people, sometimes in no uncertain terms, that because of Adam and Eve’s sin, they were born sinners, and they were born into a fallen world. Because people had this mindset, they could see nothing wrong in chopping down forests that purify the air we breathe, poisoning our water systems, polluting our air with chemicals, and using up our rich, arable land.
They could see no reason to protect the wildlife that roams our land and swims in our seas. In Australia, 100 of our 237 endemic species are declared extinct. The global wildlife populations have fallen 69 per cent.
When we think of these things and learn of wars, of genocide, of starvation of millions, including little children, our hearts are torn with sorrow and concern. But we cannot let ourselves be overburdened and weighed down by despair, for the goodness of our world is far greater than its evil.
We ask ourselves, what can I do to help this world in which I live? Firstly, we need to remind ourselves that this wonderful universe of ours was born out of Love, a Love so profound that it is the core energy of the universe. We catch glimpses of it in the beauty of our landscapes, the vistas of outer space on our televisions, and in the faces of those we love.
Learning of our New Story of the Universe has helped us realise we are People of Blessing, and it is Love that birthed us on this earth, and it is Love that nurtures us with life. As our consciousness deepens and we mature as human beings, we realise we cannot close our eyes or block our ears to what is going on in our world, but we are invited to join a kind of revolution – one centred on the transformative power of Love.
One of the best ways of doing this is by joining what Brian Swimme calls “heroic communities”, which foster compassion, justice, care of the needy, creative imagining, ways of life-giving thinking, ways of contemplating the wonders of our world in the small and the large, the weird and the wonderful.
From such communities, ripples of life, healing and joy will flow out to our world where it is needed. This will lead to new ways of growing our food, building our homes, making art, deepening our relationships, praying together, strengthening our wisdom traditions, restoring our ecosystems and a healing of Mother Earth.
We will learn to listen to the land and learn from her wisdom. Then we won’t fear the future, we will create it. We will revel in the beauty, grandeur, magnificence and wonder of this universe, and raise our hearts and voices in joyful gratitude, because this universe is our home.
This is the text of a talk given by Sister Jacinta Shailer SGS at the Blue Mountains Interfaith Gathering on 30 March 2025.
Jacinta Shailer is a Sister of the Good Samaritan who, who since studying ‘Culture and Creation Spirituality’ in the US in 1988, has been running courses on Creation Spirituality and Cosmology. By profession a teacher, Jacinta has qualifications in Religious Education and Creation Spirituality. Jacinta is greatly interested in arousing people’s understanding of cosmogenesis and using her photography to engender an appreciation of native flowers and our landscapes.
This article was first published in the May 2025 edition of The Good Oil, the e-magazine of the Sisters of the Good Samaritan. Republished with permission.
