This image shows Francis preaching to the birds. Now while it has been demonstrated that certain birds (some corvids, African Grays, etc) are intelligent, they require no sermon or conversion. The fault of environmental damage lies at the feet of humans alone, rooted in uncontrolled and unbounded growth and desire.
Perhaps this feast day is more a reminder that we need to hear a sermon from the birds. Once, the Passenger Pigeon occupied the skies for days, now it is extinct. Once, birds were threatened from DTT thinning their eggs, at least for now the use of this substance is controlled. Rising temperatures stress birds - one heat wave in Western Australia killed half the population of an endangered parrot. Rising sea levels are causing some countries to think about building sea walls that would cut off coastal flats that matter to migrating birds. The birds are preaching to us and telling us we are out of control. They are quite literally, the canary in the coal mine.
In my favorite psalm, Psalm 104, we are told:
12 By the streams the birds of the air have their habitation;
they sing among the branches.
The trees of the Lord are watered abundantly,
the cedars of Lebanon that he planted.
17 In them the birds build their nests;
the stork has its home in the fir trees.
We learn here that there is a place for everything and everything has a place - though this is in a time before virsuses, bacteria and disease was understood, so this isn't everything that could be said, although lions also have a place in this Psalm, and hence the picture isn't all rosy either.
That caveat aside, here we see the birds preaching to us. Why don't we start listening?
