A Declaration of Living Water

We believe there is a spiritual, social, and scientific connection between the survival of human beings and the health of our shared bodies of water above and below. We declare the waters of Earth an essential and endangered living entity to be protected from harm along with all of life on Earth as an integrated living system. 

The signing of this petition demonstrates our compassion for water as a living entity.  The closed system of Earth’s water cycle is unique and undeniably present in all aspects of human and non-human life.  This water has existed for billions of years, passing through each of us in turn.  It is as much a part of our common experience as is our need for breath.  We are born from our mothers’ waters and have each known an intimate relationship to its life giving properties.  

Being simultaneously a living entity and also a part of all of life on Earth, we understand that mystics and theologians alike are capable of feeling what water feels, knowing what water knows, moving, quenching, and transforming like water.  We cannot deny that water carries our poison, our discard, our birth waters, and even our inactive DNA, that it is co-mingled with minerals, food, blood, and medicine.  We know that it carries the power to grow food and to keep our world from either withering or washing away.  Knowing all of this, we conclude that water has the right to be clean, flowing, and equally shared on this living planet. Much like each human has the right to certain life sustaining rights; so does the water.

We share the responsibility to express our common need for equal access to the forms of water essential to sustain the cycles of life on Earth.  We witness to this imbalance by speaking and acting to bring human activity into “right relationship” with Earth’s water cycles as it connects to gasses, liquids, minerals, carbon based life forms and more.  Freedom, for water, refers to the water’s ability to care for itself, to be clean, to be born from the depths of Earth in its own time, and to remain chemically autonomous, as much as humans can firstly do no harm. 

When water is denied these basic needs, it affects life on Earth in ways detrimental to the continuation of this great continuum of life that makes up our common experience on Earth.  

In accordance with this compassionate treatment of water, we recognize that violence, neglect, and imprisonment of humanity is also mistreatment of water.  We are of the water and the water is of us. 

Respectfully submitted by people of Earth as representatives of this inseparable living system we call home. 

 by Glynis Lumb 2015 

The author asks,"What would it take to make this petition a reality?"  

Learn More: (click on the link) 

Read A Declaration of the Rights of All Waters 2014 2nd Gathering of the Women's Congress for Future Generations 

 Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/18/new-zealand-whanganui-river_n_1894893.html

Water Security has been defined as "the reliable availability of an acceptable quantity and quality of water for health, livelihoods and production, coupled with an acceptable level of water-related risks."^[1] Sustainable development will not be achieved without a water secure world. A water secure world integrates a concern for the intrinsic value of water with a concern for its use for human survival and well-being. A water secure world harnesses water's productive power and minimises its destructive force. Water security also means addressing environmental protection and the negative effects of poor management. It is also concerned with ending fragmented responsibility for water and integrating water resources management across all sectors – finance, planning, agriculture, energy, tourism, industry, education and health. A water secure world reduces poverty, advances education, and increases living standards. It is a world where there is an improved quality of life for all, especially for the most vulnerable—usually women and children—who benefit most from good water governance.^{[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_security}