Why Nature is Sacred
We can find the spiritual in Nature itself
This year some of the posts I write are going to be a bit more personal, about things I’m thinking about or trying out, things that go to core of my being and who I am. I hope you’ll bear with me on this journey.
2024 was a very difficult year for me and I lost multiple family members. In addition to having to cope with the grief of that, I also experienced an existential crisis and am questioning a lot of what I thought I believed.
During January I decided I needed to strip back everything to the very basics and potentially rebuild my spirituality from the bottom up again. And when I ask myself what is at the root of what I consider important spiritually and philosophically, there is one statement above all else - Nature is Sacred. Perhaps this is something you also connect with too?
But if I am going to build a spiritual or philosophical path based on this foundation, I need to explain to myself and to anyone else who is interested, why this is the case - Why Nature is Sacred.
What do we mean by “Sacred”?
There are various dictionary definitions for “Sacred” online, here are a few I found:
“considered to be holy and deserving respect, especially because of a connection with a god.”
“considered too important to be changed”
“as in holy - not to be violated, criticized, or tampered with”
dedicated or set apart
worthy of religious veneration
entitled to reverence and respect
“as in venerated - set apart or worthy of veneration by association with God”
“as in venerable - deserving honor and respect especially by reason of age”
“the power, being, or realm understood by religious persons to be at the core of existence and to have a transformative effect on their lives and destinies.”
Bringing this all together, I am going to define Sacred as follows:
“That which is deserving of the ultimate honour, respect, and veneration because it is at the core of all existence. It is not to be violated.”
We could also consider defining what we mean by “Nature” too but I’m going to leave that for a future post.
So let’s explore 5 ways in which I believe Nature meets this definition of Sacred.
1) Nature is bigger than us
When we think about what might give our lives meaning, or what people consider worth dying for, it is often in the name of, or due to being a member of something bigger than them. Whether that is a movement, a community, a political philosophy or ideal, a religion, and so on. When we feel part of something bigger than ourselves, it is not little us alone anymore, we are part of something important, and what we do matters.
But what is it that is truly the big whole of which we are all a part? It is Nature itself.
There is a verse in the Christian Bible that refers to God as that in which “we live and move and have our being” (Acts 17v28). If that isn’t a definition of Nature, I don’t know what is!
2) Nature is our Creator and Sustainer
Another similarity between the concept of a God and Nature is that both are considered to be our creator and sustainer. Ultimately, we come from Nature. We are a manifestation of Nature.
We talk about the Earth as our Mother and it is not just poetry, it is an actual literal fact - originally all life arose from chemicals in the Earth combining (with a little help from the energy of the Sun). We did not just appear on this earth or come into the world from somewhere else, we arose up out of it, we are a part of Nature itself. It created us. When we grow from a single cell to a full human being, it is ultimately Nature that is the cause of that, whether through giving us our DNA, the history of random genetic mutations, the foods and nutrients consumed by our mother during pregnancy, and so on, we are literally created by Nature and according to its laws and systems.
And we can only live if Nature sustains us. Each day we eat and drink and take in sunshine and everything else we need - from Nature. We would immediately die without it. All life can only exist if Nature is hospitable to it. We rely on Nature completely for our ongoing existence - whether that is forces of Nature like gravity to keep us on the Earth and our atmosphere in place, the air we breathe, the warmth and energy of the sun, the food and water which we consume. We could do nothing to exist without the constant sustenence of Nature.
Our very existence is down to Nature. We owe Nature the ultimate Gratitude.
3) We know Nature exists
We don’t know if there are supernatural things like gods, spirits, and magic. Maybe these things exist and maybe they don’t. We do not have scientific proof. But we do know Nature exists (unless you are a philosophical Idealist but I’m not getting into that here).
Nature is something we can see and touch and taste and hear and smell. If we can rely on our senses (or scientific instruments) to give us accurate information then it is very clear that Nature exists. We exist. There is an ultimate context in which we live our lives. Going back to point one - it is the big whole of which we are a part. We do not have to show it’s existence through reasoning, blind faith, or the acceptance of miracles. We can see it all around us at all times.
4) It is a great teacher
Nature is very old, it has had billions of years to try things out through trial and error to see what works well (i.e. evolution) and what is the most efficient way of doing things. We can learn lessons from its wisdom, its experience. We can look at the patterns and structures of nature to see the best and strongest ways of building objects or buildings we want to. We can look at what plants animals take to deal with certain sicknesses and use that learning to see what we could use to make our medicines. And so on. We are designed by Nature to live according to certain natural laws and ways of being which enable us to best flourish e.g. we have an inherent circadian rhythm which if we live in harmony with it, we will experience good health.
Reasoning is good and Nature has given us the capacity to reason, but ultimately nothing beats experience. And billions of years of experience will always outweigh whatever humans can come up with in our short existence. I’m not saying Nature is perfect or loving/benevolent (it’s quite clearly not), but I am saying it is greater and better than us in many ways and so we can learn from it as a great teacher. Just as a religious person may look to what they believe is a revelatory message from their god(s) because of its great wisdom for lessons on how to approach life, so we can also approach Nature in the same way.
5) Nature inspires great awe
Something sacred will inspire great awe and wonder. It will often be considered of great beauty. Nature is the primary cause of our awe and wonder. When we look up at the millions of stars on a clear night, or hike to the top of a mountain and look out across the valleys below, or when we watch a great thunderstorm light up the sky, these all evoke great feelings of awe at the beauty and the sheer mighty power in front of us. All of this is Nature. Just as any religious believer will feel a sense of awe and wonder at their deity or the things they see as sacred, so we too feel these things when we look at the wonders of Nature itself.
For all these reasons, and many more I have probably not thought of, the basis of the spirituality/philosophy in my life is the phrase “Nature is Sacred.”