Just the other day, there appeared at the church door-step a strange group of people. Folks of all different ages looking through their cell phones at the church and our grounds, peering through their screens with enthusiastic anticipation. They were playing a new game who’s popularity is spreading like wildfire. This new game is called ‘Pokeman Go’.

Now, the object of Pokemon Go is to ‘set free’ little coloured creatures that show up on your screen depending on where in the real world you are. You may have to go to the gas station to find them, or to Sobey’s parking lot, or to the empty field down the road, or here at our church. The point is that you are searching to find and set free little virtual beings that are trapped in various real life locations. But they can only be seen in and through your screen.

Dear friends, this game, this ‘pokeman go’ that is so popular today can actually remind us of a deeply human task. For Pokeman go imitates in the virtual world what we must do in the real word. It imitates in the virtual world, a spiritual task that humanity must cultivate in this world. This is because within every human spirit there a deep call to become aware of the elemental beings within all of creation. Just like the virtual spirits waiting to be found in pokeman, the elemental spirits that are the plants, animals, trees, are actually longing for human beings to find them, to wake up to their reality. But not with screens, with the eyes of the heart! For Paul says in Romans, All of creation is groaning for the sons of god to awaken to them…and muster the spiritual strength to set them free.

This is why the work of becoming aware of the elemental world that so many of our congregation is involved with is so important…

May we as a community continue to strengthen our capacity to become aware of the beings of the elemental world and bring to them what they need- the liberating medicine of human reverence, gratitude and love. Otherwise, games like ‘pokeman go’ will divert and suck up the forces of this deeply human destiny into the virtual world, depriving creation of what it needs.

So as we go out into nature during these august vacation months- canoeing, camping, hiking- let us look with new eyes and new hearts at the trees, the rivers and plants. Let us look with Christs eyes and bring to these nature beings the medicine they need.