June 15th

The shops have reopened today! But will everything go back to normal? Jeremy Vine is asking around on Radio Two and in Grantham it is very quiet with no queues. Good to know!

So the consumption begins anew. Will there be a run on knickers like there was toilet paper? Will there be people scrambling for bargains because summer has only just begun?

How long will it be before the recovering earth begins to feel the full force of the return of the human industry and our contamination of the air and water we rely on for our health? How long till the lament for lost species picks up its pace again and the earth seeks new ways to curtail our activity?

How long till the pressure to restock, renew, replace, update, accumulate, compete, refresh overtakes our senses? Or have we changed? Can we sustain our stillness? Could we refrain from our indulgences and greed? What if we turned our backs on the advertisements and their unsubtle calling to our baser desires?

Instead, is there a space for the calling of the Kingdom of God to fill with peace, stillness, energy, justice, colour, care? Have we discovered the treasure in the field of lockdown that we would give up everything to own? Not to consume but to hold within our grasp and share with others like a beautiful gift that only makes sense when people gather around it to ooh and aah, and say things like, “Now I understand”, or “So this is what love for the earth feels like!”

Rachel Haig