“The world is charged with the grandeur of God” wrote Gerrard Manley Hopkins. We are created as part of nature, ‘from the dust of the earth’ (Genesis 2.7), and are charged with ‘serving and preserving’ (Genesis 2.15) the garden of creation. This is not nature worship. It is about rediscovering our place in God’s creation, our relationships with God, each other, and the earth. Jesus encouraged – even commanded – us to study birds and flowers (Matthew 6.26-28) and as we do so, we rediscover beauty, perspective and place. As Archbishop Rowan Williams has written: “Receive the world that God has given. Go for a walk. Get wet. Dig the earth.”















