Hope-filled conversations about my letter of January 17 continue, and I am deeply grateful for your dozens of blog comments, other blog postings, hundreds of e-mails, and many newspaper articles and letters to the editor. Here’s the opening to an opinion piece (“Let’s bring some hope to our fragile planet”) published just last Saturday, February 20, in the Kamloops Daily News (Kamloops), page A12, written by Dawne Taylor:

And Amaziah said to Amos, "O seer, go, flee away to the land of Judah, earn your bread there and prophesy there." - Amos 7.12

I was once at a Presbytery meeting in Northeast Saskatchewan and, as is the wont of United Church folk, we were discussing justice stuff. We like to talk about justice in United Church circles - in fact it is often one of the glues that bind us. And in that time - I think we were revisiting discussions around uranium, our involvement in the global trade of nuclear technology, and its impact on lives and the environment - when someone piped up and said, "Why are prophets so grumpy?" There was a pause and then laughter.

You may have heard about the letter by this title that I have written as an open letter to all Canadians, to be read in pulpits across the United Church this Sunday (January 17th) and personally delivered to the Governor General, the Prime Minister, and other party leaders on Jan. 18th. Others, including all parliamentarians, will also receive it.

My last message from Copenhagen was over a week ago. Daily blogs were planned to end on December 18th, but it’s time to renew my regular (normally weekly) correspondence.

Bleached coral from the Pacific Ocean was the most eloquent voice in Copenhagen this week (during the Ecumenical Celebration for Creation), accompanied by glacier stones from Greenland, dried up maize from Africa, remarkable faith leaders from around the world, and words of scripture, “For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God” (Rom. 8:19).

Thought I’d blog before midnight for a change. There’s lots happening outside of the main place of negotiations (the Bella Center) these days, so one can still be involved in important things without being on site. For the first time, I’m back to my room midday before more later afternoon/evening sessions. It’s difficult to even get into the Bella Center now, but more about that later.

Late last night I promised to share our statement, and here it is: