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14th ANNUAL EARTH DAY CELEBRATION 
one mother, one family Saturday April 16 2011 Noon – 7 pm at Ithaca Commons, Lehman Alternative Community School
Brought to you by CES, the Center for Environmental Sustainability
Earth Day Schedule of Events Ithaca Commons 12:00 noon “Home - the Movie” Center Ithaca, small atrium. Bring or buy lunch and gather round to watch this 93 minute film: “French photographer Yann Arthus-Bertrand is best known for his aerial photographs of the Earth. His latest project, the movie HOME, was released on June 5, 2009 to coincide with World Environment Day.” 1:30 pm Group discussion with Wally Woods Following the film, stay a while to discuss shared concerns. 2:30 Gather at the B. Milton Pavilion for parade participation: All ages come & take part! Ceremony and parade are choreographed to bring honor and gratitude to the four elements we use to sustain ourselves on this planet: Air, Earth, Fire and Water. 3:00 pm Opening Ceremony Brief history of Earth Day & Salute to our Planet. Community leaders invited. 3:30 Earth Day Parade The Earth is our Mother – we must take care of her. Stroll, saunter, stride and sing, wearing elemental creature costumes & waving banners, around and about the Ithaca Commons! Sign up for some special roles for which we have costumes...first come, first served. 4:30 Closing Song & Cleanup “Amazing Earth.” Lehman Alternative Community School 5:00 Earth Rhythms & Potluck: OneHeartCommunityDrumming. Lehman Alternative Community School, 111 Chestnut Street, Ithaca.
| We already have a few non-profit organizations who wish to set up displays in the available space or to parade with us around the commons.
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with a description of how you would like to show your organization's concern for our one fragile home and we will get right back to you about the space and time where you could participate. |
Amazing Earth Sung to the tune of Amazing Grace Amazing Grace how sweet the Earth; the dirt between my toes The sun pours down upon my crown; the mighty river flows.
Amazing Grace how sweet the sound of bird song in the trees. The air is dense with fragrant scents soft floating on the breeze.
Now we’ve been here four million years; sustained at her sweet breast. Let’s sing her praise for all our days then in her womb we’ll rest.
...some words that speak from the heart of all earth day celebrants:
DECLARATION OF INTERDEPENDENCE This we know We are the earth, through the plants and animals that nourish us.
We are the rains and the oceans that flow through our veins.
We are the breath of the forests of the land, and the plants of the sea.
We are human animals, related to all other life as descendants of the firstborn cell.
We share with these kin a common history, written in our genes.
We share a common present, filled with uncertainty.
And we share a common future, as yet untold.
We humans are but one of thirty million species weaving the thin layer of life enveloping the world.
The stability of communities of living things depends upon this diversity.
Linked in that web, we are interconnected — using, cleansing, sharing and replenishing the fundamental elements of life.
Our home, planet Earth, is finite; all life shares its resources and the energy from the sun, and therefore has limits to growth.
For the first time, we have touched those limits.
When we compromise the air, the water, the soil and the variety of life, we steal from the endless future to serve the fleeting present. This we believe Humans have become so numerous and our tools so powerful that we have driven fellow creatures to extinction, dammed the great rivers, torn down ancient forests, poisoned the earth, rain and wind, and ripped holes in the sky.
Our science has brought pain as well as joy; our comfort is paid for by the suffering of millions.
We are learning from our mistakes, we are mourning our vanished kin, and we now build a new politics of hope.
We respect and uphold the absolute need for clean air, water and soil.
We see that economic activities that benefit the few while shrinking the inheritance of many are wrong.
And since environmental degradation erodes biological capital forever, full ecological and social cost must enter all equations of development.
We are one brief generation in the long march of time; the future is not ours to erase.
So where knowledge is limited, we will remember all those who will walk after us, and err on the side of caution. This we resolve All this that we know and believe must now become the foundation of the way we live.
At this turning point in our relationship with Earth, we work for an evolution: from dominance to partnership; from fragmentation to connection; from insecurity, to interdependence.
Copyright © David Suzuki Foundation. www.davidsuzuki.org
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