There are many ways to celebrate God's gift of the earth. These celebrations and remembrances seem to call out deeply rooted feelings in humans. Here we will identify as many of these ecumenical celebrations as we can. If you have some suggestions for ecological liturgies we would love to hear about them and we would probably post them to this page. Email info@camdencenterfortransformation.org
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ORDINARY TIME CELEBRATIONS
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Birkas Hachamah
The name of this celebration is from the Hebrew and means "blessing of the sun". In English, the name is rendered in different ways: Birkat Hachammah or Birkas Hachoma or Birkas Hachamah.
According to the Talmud, the sun reaches the same spot in the firmament as when it was created just once every 28 years. Jews around the world take this unique solar opportunity to bless God with the prayer: “Blessed art you, O God King of the world, King of the universe, who works the act of creation.” It’s the same prayer traditionally said when seeing extraordinary natural phenomena (such as comets or spectacular landscapes), but on Birkas Hachamah the prayer is often accompanied with additional prayers and psalms. In the year 2009, Birkas Hachamah arrived the morning of April 8 (14 Nissan), a particularly fortuitous day for the cycle to begin again. The first time the blessing on the sun occurred on 14 Nissan was when the Jews were redeemed from Egypt. A subsequent time, as recorded in Megillat Esther, the decree to kill the Jews was annulled and all our enemies perished.
For more information check the following links.
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