Declaration of Interdependence

I originally wrote this piece for JustFaith Ministries in 2018. Find the original post here.

Just as a body, though one, has many parts, but all its many parts form one body, so it is with Christ. For we were all baptized by one Spirit so as to form one body—whether Jews or Gentiles, slave or free—and we were all given the one Spirit to drink. Even so the body is not made up of one part but of many. – 1 Corinthians 12:12-14

Around the time of Independence Day each year, I can’t help but lament the fact that many people in my country, the United States of America, have taken the idea of independence to a great extreme. Many in this country have lost, forgotten, or actively deny our interdependence, locally, nationally, globally.

Now if the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” it would not for that reason stop being part of the body. If the whole body were an eye, where would the sense of hearing be? If the whole body were an ear, where would the sense of smell be? But in fact God has placed the parts in the body, every one of them, just as [God] wanted them to be. If they were all one part, where would the body be? As it is, there are many parts, but one body. – 1 Corinthians 12:15-20

Both when our lens zooms in and pans out, one thing remains consistent-we are in this together- whether we were born in the U.S. or outside of it, whether we are in the U.S. or outside of it, whether we are Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Sikh, atheist, or of another belief system, whether we are human, other creature, plant, stone.  We’re all in this together. Each of us belongs. Each of us has something to contribute so that our national body and our global body function well. “If [we] all were [the same], where would the body be?”

Last week I worked at a children’s day camp. My job was to share community- and peace-building activities. On the first day, we built a web of connection together. We sat in a circle and I began the process: with a ball of string in my hand, I said my name and something cool about myself (“I can sing!”). I invited anyone who shared that trait to raise their hands. Then, holding onto the string, I rolled the string ball to a child who then introduced herself (“I like ice cream!”), more hands raised, and more string ball-passing. After everyone had introduced themselves, we had a beautiful web of connection. I asked one child to pull on the string and anyone who felt their own string getting tighter to raise their hands.  Almost always, more than the 2 children directly connected to the puller raised their hands.  After illustrating this phenomenon a few times, I asked all the children to pull on the string at once.  It broke, sometimes in several places. We talked about how we are all connected, even if we don’t readily see the connections, about how the stress of one person affects many people, and about how multiple points of tension (or one really fierce point of tension) can break connections. I urged the kids to take care of each other during their camp week, to be gentle with each other so as to avoid broken connections. Throughout the week, we played cooperative games and I introduced them to elements of nonviolent communication.

The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!” And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!” On the contrary, those parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. And the parts that are unpresentable are treated with special modesty, while our presentable parts need no special treatment. – 1 Corinthians 12:21-24

Perhaps we adults would benefit from playing cooperative games. Perhaps we adults should create a visual and tactile web to remind ourselves that we are in this together, we need each other, and that those who “seem to be weaker are indispensable, and [those] that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor.” So many of us seem awfully eager to distance ourselves from this person or that one, this group or another, as we try to distance ourselves, tension in the web increases. We blame some people who “seem to be weaker” for their weakness and deny them the care they need, forgetting that they are “indispensable.” We shut down conversations because we know we are right and “they” are wrong (we are honorable and they are less honorable). The more we pull away, denying our interdependence and our need for each other, the more tension we create. We’ve already broken our web in many places—separating undocumented children from their parents being only the most recent and obvious example. Police shootings of unarmed persons of color. Mass school shootings. Removing some environmental protections. Members of Congress using strongarm tactics, rather than compromise that honors the needs of all. Limiting our friendships to those we agree with.

But God has put the body together, giving greater honor to the parts that lacked it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other. If one part suffers, every part suffers with it; if one part is honored, every part rejoices with it. – 1 Corinthians 12:24-26

How can we honor the places that seem to lack it? How can we find unity in our diversity, allowing all to play our unique and important roles? How can we reduce our own and others’ suffering? What can we honor in each other and rejoice in our interdependence?

How I Got My Wings, Part 3: Ceremony

Read How I Got My Wings, Part 1: Dead Cardinal here.

Read How I Got My Wings, Part 2: Second Encounter here.


On January 29, 2021, I took the dead cardinal wrapped in the dishtowel and plastic bag out of my freezer. It was afternoon and the impulse to do something with the body came suddenly and strongly.

I gently unwrapped it and began the work. Standing at my kitchen counter, I started plucking out breast feathers, feeling both certain and uncertain at once. Thankfully, Knowing helped me to overcome all the messages that have kept me in unknowing for so long. There is still so much unknowing to shed.

Soon after I started the process, I stopped. What I was doing was sacred work and deserved to be treated as such. This was ceremony.

Robin Wall Kimmerer wrote, “Ceremonies transcend the boundaries of the individual and resonate beyond the human realm. These acts of reverence are powerfully pragmatic. These are ceremonies that magnify life.”

I lit sage and palo santo, blessed the body, blessed myself, and allowed myself to feel the heaviness of what I was doing. I shed tears, perhaps as much to commemorate the life no longer in this body as to commemorate the beauty of the moment of reverence I was living in.

After the blessing I resumed the work. I pulled as many soft, downy breast and back feathers out as would come easily and paused. What now?

I broke the wings off, tears still rolling.

I broke off a leg.

The unknowing asked as it had the previous week, “What are you doing?!?”

Knowing answered, “What needs to be done.”

After removing these parts, it was clear that I was finished with this part of the ceremony. I placed the feathers and leg in a bag, the wings carefully on top. I still didn’t know what to do with them, only that I was to keep them.

I asked Spirit/God/the Universe (these feel like different names for the same Oneness of which we are a part) what I should do with the body. It didn’t feel right to simply throw it away. The answer was to put it in my yard, not buried, but simply placed on the snowy ground, trusting that Nature would finish the ceremony in my absence.

The next day I went back out and something had begun to eat the body. By the third day there was no sign of it.

Life circling death circling life.

How I Got My Wings, Part 2: Second Encounter

Read How I Got My Wings, Part 1: Dead Cardinal here.


It was January 22, 2021 and I was walking with a neighbor. We chose a route that took us down Frankfort Avenue. I hadn’t walked that way since November. As we strolled along chatting, we came upon a dead cardinal. Though not in the middle of the sidewalk, it was in dirt to the side of where I had seen the body two months before. On that January day I couldn’t remember exactly when I’d seen the first dead cardinal, but I knew I’d taken a picture. When I found the photo, I discovered that I had taken it almost exactly 2 months before. Two whole months.

When I told my neighbor of the first dead avian encounter, she asked if this was the same bird. I had no idea, but I really hoped so, because if it wasn’t, that meant that more than one cardinal had died in that spot recently.

By the time we went on the walk, I had the awareness that birds were going to be working with me in 2021 (incidentally, I believe my relationship with birds will continue beyond this year). I had bought the feather-pattern leggings to commemorate the connection.

Seeing the cardinal, I knew I couldn’t just leave it there. Like the first time, I had nothing with which to pick it up, but I resolved to go back and get it. Why? I didn’t know, but it felt important. Crucial. That bird was there for me.

As I write that, I am imagining some who may read this and think, “The bird was for you? What? The dead bird? That had been lying there for 2 months? Really? Who are you? Also, that’s gross.”

The same doubts and hesitations reared up in me, too. Thankfully, I have had many experiences of being called to actions that may seem bizarre or unwise by conventional standards that have led me down beautiful paths and unexpected adventures. I knew to trust the quiet voice instead of the screaming ones.

My neighbor and I finished our walk. I went into my home long enough to get my car keys and a dishtowel, and drove back to where the dead cardinal lay.

Ever so gently I picked the body up in the dishtowel and placed it carefully on the passenger car seat. When I picked it up, I saw that the body seemed to be intact except for missing eyes. How was it in such good condition after so long? I had no idea.

I drove home and once there, I had a dilemma. I still had no idea what I was supposed to do with the cardinal body. I think that day I pulled a few tail feathers from it. But then what? I knew I wasn’t supposed to throw the body away. I knew I couldn’t just leave it on my countertop until I knew what to do.

I wrapped the cloth all the way around the body, placed the cloth in a plastic bag, tied that shut, and put it in my freezer.

Though at my core I knew I was doing what I needed to, the inner critic voices were loud. “This is nuts. What in the world are you doing? You just put a dead bird in your freezer. What will other people think? You’re vegetarian, for God’s sake!”

A week later I knew what to do.


Read How I Got My Wings, Part 3: Ceremony here.