(CNN) – In a story that would seem to be some kind of satire, a seminary where students gathered together during a chapel ceremony to “confess,” “grieve” and “sorrow in prayer” toward an assortment of potted plants laid out on the floor, actually took place as a part of an activity that, school officials say, was done to “atone for the harm” caused by climate change. Union Theological Seminary (UTS), a progressive-identifying school located in New York City, which is affiliated with nearby Columbia University, tweeted out a picture and message on Tuesday from a chapel meeting where students gathered around various
plants as an “offering” to the “beings who sustain us but whose gift we too often fail to honor.” The tweet asked the question, “What do you confess to the plants in your life?” In subsequent tweets following the initial announcement, the school continued to refer to plants as “beings,” and acknowledged they were “worshiping,” and “speaking directly in repentance. “We’ve had many questions about yesterday’s chapel, conducted as part of @ccarvalhaes‘ class, ‘Extractivism: A Ritual/Liturgical Response.’ In worship, our community confessed the harm we’ve done to plants, speaking directly in repentance,” the tweet reads. READ MORE
