Use and Contemplation: Human Interaction with Nature According to the Will of God

Many Christians speak of our “use” of created things. This language often is invoked in discussions having to do with the environment as a way to defend various human activities that affect nature. The best of this rhetoric focuses on the use of things in a way that glorifies the Creator. Yet, most modern Christians do not recognize the more primary way humans are to relate to creation: the pure contemplation of it. From Adam’s naming of the animals to Jesus’ call to “consider the lilies of the field”  and to “behold” the renewed heavens and earth, before humans can make proper use of created things, we must first lean to perceive their true nature as a communication of, and gift from, God. The second stage of the Christian life of prayer according to ancient teaching is illumination, often equated with “natural contemplation.” It is what Saint Paul refers to in the first chapter of his letter to the Romans (1:20). This retreat focuses on the practice of Christian contemplative prayer and its effects on how we perceive and relate to the natural world. It will help us more clearly to perceive the Christian’s moral and spiritual duty within and toward God’s created order.