Consider, if you will, a Great Story that originated with Brian Swimme, Thomas Berry and others, and now being told by the Rev. Michael Dowd and his partner, the poetic Connie Barlow. This fascinating story explains the blending of science and religion into a new myth-story. This new story contains all the elements of scientific truth as we know it today. But it also contains all creation myths through the ages.

They remind us that every culture has a creation story, and each creation story is based on the knowledge of that society at the creation of the story. An example might be the original peoples of Greece. Their gods were defined in human terms, but were capable of supernatural powers. That story, though important as part of our historical knowledge of the peoples of those times, is no longer a valid basis for decisions needed in today’s complicated and interdependent world.

Through science, we can begin to understand that our 14-billion-year-old creation story encompasses our journey beginning with the Big Bang, or as it is called in the Great Story, “the Creative Radiance.” From there we experienced the atomic fusion of elements until we became stars that eventually burst forth our elements back into the creating universe, only to coalesce into more complex elements and form new stars, and eventually galaxies. Because of this evolving process, our bodies contain the very elements of the stars, of iron, of calcium, carbon, oxygen, hydrogen. All life on the planet, the soil, the oceans, the air we breathe, the entire Cosmos…all star stuff.

Upon hearing this “Great Story,” we begin to understand the reality, the truthfulness and importance of the fact that everything is interdependent.

I propose that if we truly understand that everything is interdependent, we come face to face with the challenges implicit in that simple, yet profound statement.

Do you remember Al Gore’s book, “Earth in the Balance?” Did you read Gro Brundtlands, “Our Common Future?” Reading these two books years ago, I became more fully aware of the drastic consequences of our current lifestyles.

And now, with “The Great Story,” we become aware that we are the evolutionary products of 14 billion years of the birth and death of stars. Our health and survival depends on the health and survival of other parts of the universe. We are responsible not just for those of us lucky enough to live in the United States, but responsible for Earth, our only home. “How will our story end?”

What if each person who reads this column were to write a letter to senators Collins and Snowe to let them know that we expect them to vote for every measure that further protects our blue-green Earth? What if each one of us made a personal commitment to change the light bulbs in our home to compact fluorescent bulbs? What if we woke up each morning with the commitment to do our small, yet crucial, part to change our personal lifestyles to reflect our knowledge of the Earth crisis?

How then will our story end?

Sally Breen lives in Windham.