The Sacramental Paradigm of Nature Philip Hefner Earth Week is getting a lot of attention in Hyde Park. My contribution to this rather mind-boggling range of reflection asks you to ponder for a few moments what we think this earth, this world of nature, is, how we image the nature that the planet, and we as citizens of the planet, are made of. This nature, after all, constitutes the envi-ronment whose crisis is being surveyed this week, by some as a challenge for action and by others as a liberal fiction. One can hardly avoid the parallel with those who insist that the Holocaust of World War II is likewise a hoax. Nature is the stuff of the species Homo sapiens who has brought us to the edge of the crisis.
Nature also forms the substance of all our efforts to find a way out of the crisis.
The place I want to start with our image of nature is here at the altar, where in a few minutes we will make Eucharist together, share IN THE Supper of our Lord, bread and wine, body and blood of the Jesus whose resur-rection we celebrate at Easter. And they also set forth an image of nature. If we look at our basic 16th century documents of faith, we'll gain clarity on this image by noting what we're opposed to. We're basically opposed to three positions. The view that bread and wine are not good enough to bear the promise, that they have to be changed in some way, transubstantiated.