Hope grows: the Earth suffers significant damage yet still manages to renew itself each spring. We should look to it to teach us about something vital to our existence--hope.

Faith in the future is not dead in our hearts. Better still, it is this hope, deepened and purified, which seems bound to save us.

--Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, S.J.

In the Northern Hemisphere of our planet the season of springtime hurrahs with new life at the same time that the sacred season of Easier is being celebrated. Both events, Easter and the springtime of Earth, remind me of the power of hope that can be found in the mystery of death and new life. In spite of the deathlike struggles that both people and the planet experience, there is hope for the future. The Easter stories enliven this confidence. The story of Earth also nurtures this hope.

Hope is vital for our existence. We cannot live without it. When hope dies, we die. We may still be alive physically, but if hope leaves us, the juice and vitality of our spirit withers and fades until there is just a barren wasteland within us. Hope is the container of our willingness to move on with faith in the future.

Our hope is most often deepened and purified when it is challenged. When difficulties and misfortunes occur, there is always the possibility of becoming bitter, hostile, and fearful. On the other hand, there are those who gradually move beyond the overwhelming loss and come to accept hope in their hearts, trusting they will get through the pain and find some kind of positive growth because of what they have experienced.

It is true that some things can never be recovered. Loved ones die, accidents cause permanent impairment, species are terminated, natural resources are gone forever. Yet, I believe in hope. My own experience, along with many wounded people who have shared their stories of subsequent growth and healing with me, has persuaded me of the necessity to have hope.

I also believe in the power of hope because I have seen Earth survive terrible blows and recover from significant distress. Amid the pain and struggle, the raw wounds of violence, and the poisonous harm being done to our planet and to individuals, there are numerous reasons to continue to have hope in the future. A huge amount of goodness rests in the hearts of humankind, and much resilience shines through the innermost part of creation.

Earth's resiliency can teach us much about hope. The yearning toward life is strong and deep in nature. The pattern in creation is an Easter pattern of transformation: Life is followed by death, and out of death comes new life.

The seasons teach us this, as do many other aspects of nature. A dry, brown seed is pressed into a dark space of soil, and there it gestates into a new green shoot. An old saguaro cactus with many holes in the arms and trunk lives on and provides a habitat for a variety of creatures. Bushes of green beans given up for dead in the dry garden blossom again after an inch of rain. A three-legged doe, the fourth leg broken and held high, births two young fawns and nurtures them. A flooded cornfield yields a generous crop the following year. Fireweed grows on a mountainside after a devastating fire. Determined grass pushes its way up through the cracks of a concrete parking lot. A green shoot emerges out of a dead tree stump.

Humans also experience the power of transformation. A pregnant Mozambican woman is caught in a raging flood. She spends three days in a tree, where she not only survives but also gives birth to a healthy child while in that tree. Others in harsh situations also make it through them. People with serious illness, thwarted dreams, lost jobs, violated bodies, trampled spirits, and grief so deep it penetrates to the core of the soul gradually return to a sense of peace and acceptance.

Those who lose homes in floods, fires, or earthquakes slowly put the pieces of their lives back together. It may take a long time, but something deep inside tells them they must go on, that there is more of life yet to live. The voice of hope tells them they can move on into the future. It asks them to trust in the possibility of unfolding happiness even if they can never reclaim what has been lost.

We often do not know until years later how something seemingly hopeless might positively influence the future. Roger and Mary Williams, founders of Rhode Island, were buried side by side in a grave close to where an apple tree was planted. Many years later the local residents wanted to exhume the bodies and bury them with honor, but when they excavated the gravesite they discovered that the bodies had completely decayed, even the bones. The roots of the apple tree had fed on the phosphorus of the decaying bones and changed the human substance into food for the tree. Even in death, life goes on to nurture the future. Hope prevails.

A new consciousness of how we need to treat Earth and humankind continues to grow and widen. This growing alertness provides another reason for hope. There is a greater awareness of how Earth has been harmed, and there is a stronger desire to help her heal from this harm. More individuals are recycling materials, adopting stretches of roads and highways to keep them litter-flee, planting trees, using natural resources with greater care and conservation. People are coming closer to nature by gardening, hiking, and other outdoor activities. Legislators are passing environmental laws. Numerous national and international organizations are raising issues and writing charters about systemic changes and attitudes that are needed in order to protect and save our planet.

Farmers are using contour cultivation, hillside terracing, crop rotation, and minimum tillage, while conservation corps are reconstructing prairies and wetlands to prevent flooding and protect topsoil. Cities are developing parks, financing recycling programs, and saving "green space" to guard the land from urban sprawl. Environmentally conscious industries are creating new products that use less of Earth's precious resources, and others are taking greater care with the disposal of toxic refuse. Much, much more needs to be done to raise awareness, alter attitudes, and change behaviors on behalf of our planetary home, but positive beginnings are being nurtured.

There are many who work for the good of our world. They are quiet and often unknown people. Yet their relentless efforts to nurture peace and justice on our planet contribute daily to a slow but gradual transformation of humanity. This solidarity of kinship is an important part of hope, reminding us of our shared values and dreams. Russian cosmonaut Oleg Makarov reflected in The Home Planet (Addison-Wesley Publishing) on how, from outer space, it was easy to see our external solidarity rather than our geographic and cultural differences. He easily viewed Earth not as many separate, distant countries but as "one touchingly small sphere." From out there he saw our unity rather than our disparity. From out there we were all one people.

So, too, with French Jesuit theologian and paleontologist Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, who wrote in Building the Earth (Dimension Books) that "we are all of us together carried in the one world-womb." In this amazing web of oneness there is the unique beauty, power, and resilient dynamism of an interwoven existence. Our oneness and kinship in the great dance of life is a tremendous strength. It urges us to live and act in ways that are beneficial for all. It tells us that a sustainable future is possible, one in which everything and everyone lives in harmony, assured of a safe environment in which to grow and mature.

We cannot give up hope. We need to maintain our belief that the hope resounding in the Easter story is still attainable today, no matter how dismal or disheartening our situation might look. We need to foster a deep assurance that the beauty, joy, and nourishment our beloved Earth offers us will also continue far into the future.

I once walked in ankle-deep water across the small, narrow source of the great Mississippi River in northern Minnesota. As I did so, I thought of the myriad streams and tributaries that join to make its wide, vigorous waterway. Like that river, everyone and everything is joined in the dancing water of the cosmos. Individually we are small rivulets, but united we are a mighty river held in one great embrace by the source of all goodness.

The Easter story of the gospels and the eastering of Earth draw us into a great bond of hope. Together we can help one another in our discouraging and dark times. Together we are strong. Together we can have faith in the future. Together we will grow. Together we will cocreate a world that dances in harmony and love.

BEHOLD THIS NEWBORN CHILD

   Each time a child is born,
   particularly after a grandparent dies,
   we sense that life goes on.
   All is not lost.
   There is a deep resilience,
   stronger than the grasp of death.

   The babe is lifted high
   toward the welcoming stars,
   a young life
   with just a kernel of ripening,
   a new resident
   in the heart of existence.
   All those gathered proclaim:

   "Behold, behold, this newborn one!
   Let us nurture and keep alive
   the sacred mystery of hope
   hallowed in this young one's heart.
   We sow our dreams of a future
   in this freshly birthed being.
   We give our loving promise
   to guide and guard this child.
   Always we will remember
   our oneness in the dancing cosmos."

   The stars say not a word.
   They bow in reverence
   to this creature,
   whose adult hands will hold
   power enough
   to blow up a planet,
   or seed a waiting garden.

   The stars smile,
   for they too have hope,
   and night
   turns toward the dawn.

-- Joyce Rupp, O.S.M.

JOYCE RUPP, O.S.M. is a bestselling author and spiritual director in Des Moines. Reprinted and adapted with permission from "Hope" in The Cosmic Dance: An Invitation to Experience Our Oneness, by Joyce Rupp (Orbis Books, March 2002).