Eagle Landing Park is my church, and ecology is like a religion to me.  I put on my Sunday best: boots, rain coat, and floppy hat.  I gather the family, the four dogs, and head off to church.  The sermon today is wind in the tree tops, and silence.  In the light rain and gloom, no birds sing, not even the screech owl.  I walk through the columns and arches of the trees and branches.  It is a style of architecture that lifts me up and focuses my thoughts.   Everywhere, my church is adorned with the artwork of nature, the infinite variety and complexity of leaves, branches, tendrils, and buds.

Nature is my Creator.  It is a simple, undeniable truth.  I am a part of nature, giving and taking.  For my acts of charity, I give my time and labor to the church, restoring the ecosystem as I restore myself.  My form of worship is to walk and watch, listen and learn.  With my words and photographs, I hope to capture the beauty and magnificence of nature.  I am in Paradise when I walk through the biosphere, and I do not look for another paradise elsewhere.

Nature, my Creator, has given me immortality.  I am thirteen billion years old, the latest in a series of configurations of atoms reaching back to the beginning.  The carbon in my body was forged in a supernova billions of years ago.  The code in my genes is shared with all other species in this church.  When I no longer keep my current form, I will return to nature and give my strength to her, living on forever in some other form, a part of my biosphere.

Life on Earth is sacred and singular.  If life exists elsewhere in the universe, no other planet among the trillions of planets has life quite like that on Earth.  My main purpose in life is to defend the sacred life of Earth against those who would abuse and destroy it.  I protect this park, my church, as my own little corner of the biosphere, the place where I can have the most impact.

I have faith in science and nature.  I believe that humans are capable of wisdom and kindness.  Although people have abused and destroyed ecosystems for the past few centuries, I have faith that people will find it in their own best interests to preserve this Earth, to restore nature to her past glory.  I kneel in my church to touch the soil, the living, breathing flesh of my Creator.  I visualize a future where humans once again live in harmony with nature.

I come to my church to find peace.  There may be others who appreciate the sacred and holy nature of this place, even if we don't outwardly express such thoughts to each other.  Some come to the park for benign recreation that does not detract from the beauty of my church.  A few people defile this church either out of ignorance of its beauty and significance, or out of deliberate malice.  If there is a reason for these malicious acts, nature should not be the target.  Justice is not served by harming this church.  Those who harm my church cause harm to me.  This place is my community and my home.  Damage to the park wounds me.  This is a choice on the part of those causing the damage, to hurt this place and hurt its people without necessity or reason.  When they cause this meaningless destruction, they diminish their own lives.  Those causing harm can also choose to end those practices and acknowledge the sacred beauty in this park.  This park is me.  This park is my identity.  I am not one of those people who would deliberately harm this place and all the species present.  My park, my church, allows me to know who I am and who I am not. 

All are welcome in this public park, this church without doors.  Nature bestows her blessings on all who enter the park.  This church can accommodate all kinds, and all who visit this cathedral have the opportunity to give, to leave this place better than they found it.  Anyone can worship here.  Anyone can find peace and solace in this serene sanctuary.