Sons and Daughters of the Rainbow

Theologically speaking, a truly ecumenical challenge is opening up to inaugurate a new covenant with the Earth in such a way that it will signify the covenant that God established with Noah after the destruction wrought by the flood. There we read: "I set my bow in the clouds to serve as a sign of the covenant between me and the earth...everlasting covenant that I have established between God and all living beings--all mortal creatures that are on earth" (Gn 9:13-16). Human beings must feel that they are sons and daughters of the rainbow, those who translate this divine covenant with Gaia, the living superorganism, and with all the beings existing and living on it, with new relationships of kindness, compassion, cosmic solidarity, and deep reverence for the mystery that each one bears and reveals. Only then will there be integral liberation, of the human being and the Earth, and rather than the cry of the poor and the cry of the Earth there will be common celebration of the redeemed and the freed, human beings in our own house, on our good, great, and bountiful Mother Earth.

From Leonardo Boff's Cry of the Earth, Cry of the Poor (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1997), p. 114.