To whom does the Earth belong? If you have any doubt about it, spend time at a wildlife refuge. Even 15 minutes, let alone a couple of hours, at the Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge in New Jersey tell the answer: The Earth belongs to all creatures, not just man.

Hundreds of sandpipers gather in one spot. An osprey arises from a nest, its wing span leaving me awed. A red-winged blackbird alights gently near us on a tall stalk of grass. These scenes occur amid total quiet during an exploration along the Wildlife Drive, an unpaved 8.5-mile road through the refuge.

For miles all we can see are birds, around the fields, ravines, marshes, and water on a green expanse that fills the horizon in every direction. We hear no other sounds except birds – chirping, singing, warbling, tweeting, flitting, and squawking. We become silent, so as to take in every bit of it, listening to the bird sounds filling the air entirely. It’s mesmerizing and miraculous.

In the Forsythe Wildlife Refuge’s 47,000 acres, birds outnumber humans. On the foggy May afternoon of our visit we see hundreds and hundreds of shorebirds as well as other birds – and fewer than a dozen people. This math speaks a deep truth: I contemplate how the world belongs to all creatures. It doesn’t belong to only the humans who construct massive cities and sprawling suburbs that gobble up the land. We as a species must learn to walk and live gently upon a planet that we share with them. Many do this already; many more must follow. We must know deeply how our actions affect the creatures’ lives…and live accordingly.

An osprey appears to feed its young at a nest.

Riding on the Wildlife Refuge at slower than 10 mph affords time to look at individual birds. I see a single egret, white, beautiful, and graceful against the green of the marshlands. Since that day at the Forsythe Wildlife Refuge, the sight of that bird keeps returning to my mind. I think of its beauty.

The Message in The Images

I’ve meditated on that image of the single egret as I’ve watched the horrors for our Earth and the sea unfolding each day in the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill. I compare this life-filled image of a beautiful white bird, at peace in a refuge and thriving, with others that millions of us have seen – for example, brown pelicans, captured this past week on Grand Island, La., that are covered in oil from the spill. The oily brown ooze drenches the birds’ entire bodies. Other photos, which AP photographer Charlie Riedel captured, show birds in thick oily muck on a beach on Louisiana’s East Grand Terre Island, including one that can only be recognized as a bird because of its projecting beak. It’s heartbreaking.

An egret stands in the marshlands of the Forsythe Wildlife Refuge.

Oil from the spill covers these brown pelicans. (Photo Credit: International Bird Rescue Research Center)

The contrast of these images says much about us as people and about our responsibility to the Earth and its creatures. In one photo is a bird living fully upon an Earth where people are acting as stewards. In the others are birds whose lives are threatened by humans’ willful selfishness and lack of care.

At a moment in time looking at the egret, I realized our interdependence, its dependence upon me, and my dependence upon it. Our Earth is strong yet fragile, personified by the bird. We must treat it lovingly.

Many of us feel rage at BP’s reportedly willful carelessness and wrongdoing. A single company that disregards environmental care, covers up its actions, and lies is an extension of the worst of our human nature – greed, dishonesty, arrogance. We have known for decades that our dependence on oil is dangerous. And, as companies dig deeper and farther in the oceans, it has become more threatening to the Earth and its seas because the industry has done comparatively little research and development into technology to deal with spills. We create institutions and companies that reflect the best and worst in us.

We as individuals bear responsibility, too, in the way we live each day. Exploring that wildlife refuge, I realized how interconnected it is with the waters of the Gulf and how my actions are interconnected with it. Let us hope it is not too late to change our course and fully embrace clean energy, a solution that awaits our will and wisdom. We each must take steps to help relieve the suffering of the people and creatures in the Gulf region.

We can all decide to live in a gentler way that demands and takes less from the Earth. As the author Tony Robbins says, “A real decision is measured by the fact that you’ve taken a new action. If there’s no action, you haven’t truly decided.” If we do not take action, it is like someone sitting in a dark room doing nothing. As we see in the Gulf, the casualties will continue to be our Earth and the creatures living upon it, and we will not escape the consequences.

The Divine has given us a gift of life around us in countless ways and in awesome beauty. When we see something beautiful, we may want to stop and ask how it is that we have this gift and what it means in our lives. The solitary egret in a New Jersey marshland and the bird on the islands in Louisiana covered in oil – both are us. We must listen to what they tell us.

Further Links

The BP Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill: New York Times Resources

International Bird Rescue

Edwin B. Forsythe National Wildlife Refuge