Treedemption

(first published October 25, 2009 on Cebu Daily News Faith and inquirer.net, the website of the Philippine Daily Inquirer)

Yesterday morning in the mountain village of Cantipla, Cebu City, I joined Smart Communications personnel and University of the Philippines students in planting trees. This was a full circle event to me: I first planted trees of the flame-of-the-forest variety in Cantipla over eight years ago. I have also planted mangroves on the shores of Lilo-an and Balamban as well as mahogany, jackfruit, and cinnamon trees in Talisay City's Jaclupan and Cebu City's Lusaran watersheds.

The wisdom in planting trees has become incontrovertible amid the onslaught of floods, drought, tsunamis, and landslides around the globe. Coastland trees can weaken the impact of tsunamis. Mountain trees lower the probability of landslides occurring. Trees in valleys and plains stave off severe floods. Everywhere inland, trees stabilize the supply of underground freshwater.

The archdiocese of Cebu is reportedly breathing new energy into Archbishop Ricardo Cardinal Vidal's call in the 80's for priests to require the faithful, before being baptized, confirmed, ordained, or wed, to plant trees or donate seedlings to be planted by parish workers. The archdiocese's plan is a bright illustration of Saint Benedict of Norcia's motto, "Ora et labora" meaning "Pray and work:" The archdiocese that is putting the faithful to the work of planting trees is the one that in the first place asks God to inspire us all to grow into responsible stewards of his creation in the oratio imperata or mandatory prayer for deliverance from calamities.

While we plant trees to defend ourselves from the havoc wreaked by pollution and global warming, we need to rediscover as Filipino citizens and men and women of faith the deep roots of our relationship to trees. It is quite tragic that we have sunk to a depth from which trees are seen as disaster-combatting paraphernalia. Such an appreciation of trees is a step below the appraisal of trees as no more than economic factors of production, which in turn is a step below the animistic but at least reverential treatment we once gave trees out of respect for their alleged, invisible spiritual inhabitants.

Our archetypal Filipino literature is far friendlier to trees. Malakas and Maganda, our mythical first man and woman were conceived in the trunk of a bamboo tree. The story of Malakas and Maganda appears to be our people's foreshadowing of the Judeo-Christian tradition we have come to believe in: that Adam and Eve, the first man and woman, were created carers of creation and placed in the garden of Eden by God to enjoy his friendship and partake of the fruit of the Tree of Life.

Adam and Eve's original rebellion--eating the fruit of the forbidden Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil--kept the Tree of Life out of our reach, and I suppose every human act in history that harmed parts of the ecology, especially trees, has been an echo of that first rebellion against God and the Tree of Life. This must have been why God never failed to use a tree or two or more in the history of salvation. Noah's Ark, symbol of the saving church, was made of wood. So were the 'cushion' on which Abraham laid Isaac before the aborted sacrifice, the flowering staff of Aaron, and  the pole where Moses on God's command hung a bronze serpent to which people looked for healing after being bitten by poisonous desert snakes.

In the fullness of time, Jesus was born, and laid on a wooden manger. He crossed lakes and seas on wooden boats as he went about proclaiming God's kingdom. Long before he was crucified on a tree in the definitive act of reopening Eden to man, Jesus said: "I am the vine; you are the branches. If a man remains in me and I in him, he will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing." (John 15:5)

In Jesus, the Tree of Life is once more within our reach. Jesus' act of redeeming man by giving up his life on the wood of the cross should echo not only in our hearts but to the whole of creation, including the trees. In Jesus, the Tree of Life is ours, never to be taken away. Let us make this truth the root of our relationship to trees, bearing fruit in a love for trees over and above superstition, economics, or disaster preparedness: a love for trees that echoes our love for God and each other.