August 17, 2023


Dear friends,


These past weeks have brought more devastating climate news, including the terrible fires in Maui that have claimed so many human and other-than-human lives. Daily we learn about heat waves, floods, devastating storms, and other fires; too often the news is overwhelming and heartbreaking. We know that we must honor that truth and the grief that it brings in order to continue in our work. We hope you are finding ways to honor your own grief, as well.


When the news is so dire, paying attention — in a deep, sustained way — is a difficult calling. Yet it is in attending deeply to our particular places that we cultivate and nourish our kinship with the world around us. In a recent Lectio Terra* session with our staff and program consultants, many of us reflected on how slowing down and paying attention to the smallest things in our environment brought about shifts — often substantial — in how we relate to ourselves and our Earth home.


During Convocation 2023 this September in Hallowell, Maine, we'll practice paying attention together and exploring our relationships to one another and to the more-than-human world. Our theme — "Kinship: Re-Weaving the Great Web of Belonging" —

speaks to a deeply integrated, whole-hearted way of living in the world. We hope you'll join us for two days of talks, meals, contemplative practice, music, and spiritual exploration — including Lectio Terra sessions! — opportunities for attending to our kinship in these days of climate chaos.


We are also offering a Special Group Rate for faith communities through the month of August! You can register four people from your group for a price of $500 — just $125 per person. Please click here for more information on the group rate.


This August also brings two online program opportunities. First, we have our next Leadership Commons Open House, highlighting a resource developed by Ophelia Hu Kinney for faith leaders working with youth. And the final installment of our Summer Fiction Book Club will be an opportunity to gather online and discuss The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson. We'll be joined by special guest Derrick Weston, Theological Education and Training Coordinator at Creation Justice Ministries.


And, in the spirit of a practice of paying attention, we are pleased to partner with Rabbi Katy Allen to feature some of the Earth Etudes she has compiled during the Jewish month of Elul. See below for an introduction from Rabbi Katy and more ways to engage with the Etudes!


We look forward to seeing you in person or online in the near future!


With best wishes,

The BTS Center Team

* In our climate-changed world, the Bible invites us back into communion both with God and the more-than-human community, by re-engaging with our stories through the lens of the very real geographies where we make our homes. Lectio Terra is a practice based in Lectio Divina which invites us to engage with both scriptural texts and the text of creation.

Join us for these Upcoming Programs!


Leadership Commons Open House


Summer Fiction Book Club

  • One final session: Thursday, August 24 • 11.00am - 12.15pm (Eastern) • Online
  • Discussing The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson
  • Read the novel ahead of time and come to discuss!


Convocation 2023

  • Thursday & Friday, September 28 & 29
  • In person at Maple Hill Inn and Conference Center (Hallowell, Maine)
  • Speakers include Victoria Loorz, author of Church of the Wild: How Nature Invites Us Into the Sacred; and John Bear Mitchell, citizen of the Penobscot Nation from Indian Island in Maine, musician, storyteller, and lecturer in Wabanaki Studies and Multicultural Studies at the University of Maine.
  • Our Convocation musician is Rev. Liz Fulmer, a queer pastor, recording artist, and musical storyteller serving Grandview Church in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
  • A Convocation schedule, presenter bios, and other details are available at Convocation2023.org. Check back regularly for more!

During the Jewish month of Elul, The BTS Center is pleased to bring you a selection of the "Earth Etudes of Elul," compiled and curated by Rabbi Katy Allen.


See below for Rabbi Katy's introduction to the Etudes, and check our Facebook page and newsletters over the next month for postings of some of the offerings.


The Jewish month of Elul, which begins in August, is the “Sunday of the Jewish year.” Elul is a time of reflection and preparation for the new year and the Yamim Nora’im, the Days of Awe. During Elul we begin blowing and hearing the shofar, the wordless prayer that touches us in our kishkes (gut) and reminds us to do the spiritual work of getting ready to face G!d with an empty stomach and an open heart on Yom Kippur, and ask for forgiveness.


The 30 days of Elul are a time for cheshbon hanefesh (soul searching) and teshuvah (return, repentance). They are a time to turn from the ways in which we have missed the mark and return to G!d and our best selves. Elul is a time to be reborn, transformed, and renewed. It is also a time of love and caring — the Hebrew letters of the month’s name correspond to the first letters of the verse, Ani l'dodi, v'l'dodi li, “I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine” (Song of Songs 6:3).


To help us on our journey through Elul, we at Jewish Climate Action Network - MA and Ma’yan Tikvah have gathered from among ourselves and our friends a series of reflections for the month of Elul, teachings that connect Earth and Torah, which we call “Earth Etudes for Elul.” In these daily reflections, rabbis, poets, environmentalists, and seekers write for all our beloveds, and in these painful days of scorching heat, wildfires, rising seas, and increasing despair, they remind us to reconnect to our beloved Earth and be strengthened.


We invite you to step through the wide-open doorway into Elul with us as we begin our journey together, beginning Thursday evening, August 17 and continuing daily through the month of Elul. You can sign up here to get them in your inbox each day.


This year for the first time, we will be hosting An Evening of Earth Etudes for Elul Live, a time of reading and reflection, during which selected Etude writers will join us to share their works and engage with us in meditation and thoughtful conversation. Sign up here to join us on Thursday, August 24, from 7:00-8:30 PM EDT.


Rabbi Katy Allen is the founder and rabbi of Ma'yan Tikvah - A Wellspring of Hope, which holds services outdoors all year long and has a growing children’s outdoor learning program, Y’ladim BaTeva. She is the founder of the Jewish Climate Action Network - MA, a board certified chaplain, and a former hospital and hospice chaplain. She received her ordination from the Academy for Jewish Religion in Yonkers, NY, in 2005. She is the author of A Tree of Life: A Story in Word, Image, and Text and lives in Wayland, MA, with her spouse, Gabi Mezger, who leads the singing at Ma'yan Tikvah.

The BTS Center | 207.774.5212 | info@thebtscenter.org | www.thebtscenter.org

 Our mission is to catalyze spiritual imagination with enduring wisdom for transformative faith leadership. We offer theologically grounded programs of continuing education and spiritual formation, including workshops and retreats, learning cohorts, public conversations, and projects of applied research.
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