we have Easter Sunday with Christ, who loved sparrows (as he loved all): "several apocryphal books of early Christian times relate that the child Jesus, playing near Joseph's workshop, made twelve little birds out of clay; he breathed on them and they came to life and flew off. Mystics see in these twelve clay sparrows the image of twelve disciples whom Jesus chose among his many followers and whom the breath of the Holy Spirit, at Pentecost, made into men" *
but - we are losing our sparrows. . .
World Sparrow Day, March 20th (and I, obviously, am too slow creating this post), designated to raise awareness of increasing
threats to the existence of House Sparrows and other common birds - an international initiative by the Nature Forever Society of India in collaboration with the Eco-Sys Action Foundation (France) and numerous other national/international organizations across the world. The Nature Forever Society, started by Mohammed Dilawar, an Indian conservationist who began his work helping House Sparrows in Nashik, and who was named a "Hero of the Environment" for 2008 by Time for these efforts
"for the first Christian artists who decorated the catacombs, the humble and symbolic sparrow represented the human soul delivered by death from the bondages of life, mounting joyfully to heaven"*
Perhaps, strangely enough, (perhaps not) Easter has a greater inner meaning for me because of Christ's love of sparrows. May we be able to behold them (and protect them) as Christ did/would have.
*my thanks to The Bestiary of Christ, by Louis Charbonneau-Lassay, translated and abridged by D M Dooling, and of course, to
Angelee Deodhar
see you in a moment
ayaz daryl nielsen darylayaz@me.com
