Sabbath Poems: I

Life has been full of changes.

One is a deep desire to write again. After being thoroughly inspired by Berry's A Timbered Choir, I decided to take time to practice my writing on the Sabbath each week.

This comes out of my own deep anguish over changes and loss in life. Roxy and I are facing many changes in the next months, and have faced many in the past months. I'll let the poem speak for itself.

How can human life, in living time remain
in endless flux, changeless change the only
straighened roundabout? Yet we must walk, and obtain
our way. But now, how not to be lonely?

A child's little childhood, passing, yet barely born
to an endless progression, its awaiting disparate fate;
and the warmth of friendship, dispersed, adorned
only now with memory - so we hold, groan, and wait.

Now.
We in this turbulent world long to, must reach out, grasp
signposts of another, His life given for ours -
and returned: all fleeting put to flight in one flash
the promise borne anew sprouts, shoots, flowers

and though goes to seed, stays ever the same
to be held in love, grateful. The signs
which accompany us - as I-thou we become - though in pain,
hopeful, planted, watered. In seeking do we find.

On Cow farts and Fasting

Some time ago I posted about the rather ingenious (if not sometimes ridiculous) measures being taken to tackle bovine emissions. There is a very informative article with heaps of links here at Grist News. I can't help but quote one short section,

According to an EPA FAQ about methane and livestock in the U.S. alone, cattle emit about 5.5 million metric tons of methane per year into the atmosphere—20 percent of U.S. methane emissions. And there 1.5 billion belching cattle here on earth, a number that is expected to grow rapidly as earth’s meat-hungry population expands.

It’s perhaps not surprising that scientists all over the world are trying to figure out how we can have our meat and eat it, too. Their attempts to make cattle emit less methane include alterations in diet, breeding, and even a vaccine.

What was surprising (at least to me) is that grazing, grass-fed cattle—those happy cows we all like to celebrate, and some of us (hi, Ed) like to eat—will, according to Eshel, emit four to five more methane than corn-fed cattle.

But wait—that doesn’t mean that you should reach for a CAFO burger.

The answer, upon reflection, is NO. But I think that this question emerges as a natural one ought to reveal the sort of scientific reductionism which massively limits our imaginations and binds us to certain ways of thinking. If we try to graph the equation it might look something like this:

(emissions of 1.5 billion cattle) x (CAFO Corn-fed diet) > (emissions of 1.5 billion cattle) x (grass-fed beef)
= CAFO cattle are more 'environmentally friendly'/ produce less emissions, etc.

What this logic fails to discern (and is arguably unable to discern), is the actual possibility of consuming less beef in the first place. Of course we need to consider how diet might effect the cows emissions, but what this implicitly blinds us to is accepting the current levels of consumption. And if you have an ear for it, you will find this sort of logic everywhere. It pervades most all of the discussions around the 'green' movement, "how can we save the planet and ensure that the economy continues on a path of exponential growth?" The (il)logic of this economic wrangling was a discussion point in my earlier post and has been wonderfully noted here:

Just because corn-fed cows emit less methane does not make them better, says Eshel, and the idea that we can convert cows into low-methane systems by feeding them corn is like asking a giraffe to graze on grass. “It’s evolutionary advantage is lost,” he says. He contends methane is a normal end-product (actually, a product of both ends) of healthy, grazing cows. Re-plumbing cows to emit less methane is, he says, absurd. “Maybe what we need to do is consider the scope of our reliance on those animals, rather than trying to re-evolve them into something that is advantageous to us,” he suggests.

What this logic simply cannot account for, but what is desperately needed, is serious personal and collective discipline. And yet this falls squarely outside the bounds of business. Just think of what would happen if the beef industry advertised a plan to reduce emissions that included fasting from meat one day a week. Imagine if the CAFO's lobbied the government to pass a law prohibiting the sale of beef on Sundays. Possible? Hardly. What sort of business would go for such things? Yet, these same businesses are now funding studies to shove tubes up the rear ends of cows to 'collect' their emissions for processing. Hmmm.

If we honestly look at the harmful effects our consumption has on our bodies, minds, and souls, I believe fasting is one important act of personal repentance. It is also one of the greatest resources which our tradition has to offer our out-of-control world of consumption, a world which I find myself continually caught up in. We simply cannot continue to "have our cake (or in this case, cow) and eat it too". Not with 6 billion people. Not with 1.5 billion cows.

The UN and WHO report there are currently over 900 million people living without the necessary nutrients to sustain life. That number is only surpassed by the 1.5 billion among us who are overweight and an additional 400 million who are obese. Yes, on this planet, 1 billion have too little to survive, while 2 billion have more than their bodies can process.

What do we do as people of faith, in light of these facts?

Could fasting be one action that we consider?

Over the last few months Roxy and I have adopted a diet that is 90% Vegan. For us, this means that meat and dairy products (yes, cheese and eggs too) make up less than 10% of our weekly diets, and we have reserved eating meat for special 'feast days' on the weekend. I have found this incredibly challenging, but also deeply rewarding. We are (re)learning to cook with real, whole foods. Since the majority of processed foods in the grocery stores include some form of milk products, our meals no longer include them. We are finding vegetables and legumes which we never knew existed now comprise much our daily diet. What is more, there is a certain solidarity that we feel with those who cannot afford the luxuries of meat as we voluntarily eat less.

Before you write us off as freaks, consider again the facts. 1 billion undernourished, 2 billion overweight/obese. To my mind, this is not a mere matter of food production or even of distribution. It is about the cultural myths which lie deeply in our minds that somehow we do not have enough, that we need more, when in actual fact, we have enough right here, right now. It is the myth of scarcity in a creation of plenty, and I believe it is a serious call to action and reflection.

An Easter Prayer

O Lord God, our Father.

You are the light that can never be put out; and now you give us a light that shall drive away all darkness.
You are love without coldness, and you have given us such warmth in our hearts that we can love all when we meet.

You are the life that defies death, and you have opened for us the way that leads to eternal life.

None of us is a great Christian; we are all humble and ordinary.

But your grace is enough for us.

Arouse in us that small degree of joy and thankfulness of which we are capable,
to the timid faith which we can muster,
to the cautious obedience which we cannot refuse,
and thus to the wholeness of life which you have prepared for all of us
through the death and resurrection of your Son.

Do not allow any of us to remain apathetic or indifferent to the wondrous glory of Easter,
but let the light of our risen Lord reach every corner of our dull hearts.

We pray this through Jesus Christ, our risen Lord, Amen

--Karl Barth


(the blogging is on hold as the end of term quickly approaches. To be continued...)

Friedman, Marx, and the conservative(s)

At risk of being written off as a 'damn communist/socialist', I offer a brief excerpt from Marx's Manifesto. My only defense is that i ran across it in a book of a very different era and kind - Thomas Friedman's The World is Flat (2005). Friedman has been a senior Foreign Affairs correspondent for the New York Times. This book represents his lengthy reflections upon Globalization after the turn of the millenium. (More to come on Friedman, as his latest book represents a major shift in tone - this Hot, Flat, and Crowded finds the great challenges facing us as a planet and, in contrast to the previous work, doesn't believe that global expansion and deregulation will solve things.)

Recall that Marx penned these words in 1848...


All fixed, fast, frozen relations, with their train of ancient and venerable prejudices and opinions, are swept away, all new-formed ones become antiquated before they can ossify. All that is solid melts into air, all that is holy is profaned, and man is at last compelled to face with sober senses his real conditions of life and his relations with his kind. The need of a constantly expanding market for its products chases the bourgeoisie over the whole surface of the globe. It must nestle everywhere, settle everywhere, establish connections everywhere.

The bourgeoisie has through its exploitation of the world market given a cosmopolitan character to production and consumption in every country. To the great chagrin of reactionaries, it has drawn from under the feet of industry the national ground on which it stood. All old-established national industries have been destroyed or are daily being destroyed. They are dislodged by new industries, whose introduction becomes a life and death question for all civilized nations, by industries that no longer work up indigenous raw material, but raw material drawn from the remotest zones; industries whose products are consumed, not only at home, but in every quarter of the globe.

In the place of old wants, satisfied by the production of the country, we find new wants, requiring for their satisfaction the products of distant lands and climes. In place of the old local and national seclusion and self-sufficiency, we have intercourse in every direction, universal inter-dependence of nations. The intellectual creations of individual nations become common property. National one-sidedness and narrow-mindedness become more and more impossible, and from the numerous national and local literatures there arises a world literature.

The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian nations into civilization. The cheap prices of commodities are the heavy artillery with which it batters down all Chinese walls, with which it forces the barbarians’ intensely obstinate hatred of foreigners to capitulate. It compels all nations, on pain of extinction, to adopt the bourgeois mode of production; it compels them to introduce what it calls civilization into their midst, i.e., to become bourgeois themselves.

In one word, it creates a world after its own image.

Friedman then provides some commentary on this passage, noting in particular the resemblance between a world which had begun to see the Industrial Revolution, and one which now faces the Global Flattening Revolution. He quotes a conversation with Harvard political theorist Michael Sandel,

"...a flat, frictionless world is a mixed blessing. It may, as you suggest, be good for global business. Or it may, as Marx believed, augur well for a proletarian revolution. But it may also pose a threat to the distinctive places and communities that give us our bearings, that locate us in the world. From the first stirrings of capitalism, people have imagined the possibility of the world as a perfect market - unimpeded by protectionist pressures, disparate legal systems, cultural and linguistic differences, or ideological disagreement. But this vision has always bumped up against the world as it actually is - full of sources of friction and inefficiency. Some obstacles to a frictionless global market are truly sources of waste and lost opportunities. But some of these inefficiencies are institutions, habits, cultures, and traditions that people cherish precisely because they reflect nonmarket values like social cohesion, religious faith, and national pride. If global markets and new communications technologies flatten these differences, we may lost something important. That is why the debate about capitalism has been, from the very beginning, about which frictions, barriers, and boundaries are mere sources of waste and inefficiency, and which are sources of identity and belonging that we should try to protect." (pg. 204)

It strikes me that this debate also draws out a range of responses - the scale of which is broader than simply 'liberal' and 'conservative'. (The caricature being that the liberals want to sit and sip coffee while the governments hand out checks to everyone, while the conservatives want governments to get out of the way so that we can all compete.) While there are echoes of truth in these caricatures and we need to think about them very carefully, I have become increasingly convinced that there are (at least) two kinds of conservatives.

The first is concerned to protect the small community which he is rooted in - the health of its people and land, the sense of trust neighbors have with one another, the ease with which children grow up free to roam and play. They don't particularly like politics, but care very much about which people are running their town hall meetings! The second is concerned with his or her own freedom to do as they please and with the need for governments to get out of the way. Though they also live in a relatively small community, they regard high property values and low taxes as the main reason for their being there. They see no reason why jobs shouldn't be outsourced, for it could mean - in the big picture - that we make more money at home.

This is a perplexing constrast. Friedman seems to be in the second category at least when it regards economics. He is largely positive towards the 'flattening' of the world (even if it entails the removal of the sort of boundaries that Sandel points to), believes that the less we restrict individual liberty and creativity the better it will be for all of us. And yet, 3 years later he writes a book which claims, "America has a problem and the world has a problem... it's getting Hot, Flat, and Crowded." Furthermore, our businesses haven't creatively anticipated these problems and our governments haven't shaped policy which could help businesses to move in this direction either. Individuals bicker about the demands of change in lifestyle. So where do we go from here? Well, one option is to return to an older form of conservatism which conserves the local embodied community and the virtues thereof.

I intend to blog further on Friedman as I continue reading. Feel free to join the discussion.

Michael Pollan at UBC - June 6th!!!

So here is a bit of a plug for a writer I've found extremely insightful and provocative as I've explored issues related to food - Michael Pollan.

His books, notably The Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food have born a very fruitful response (no pun intended) from a wide range of readers. (If you read one book as an introduction to food issues, read In Defense of Food.)

He has written widely - both publicly and politically - urging leaders to think critically about the state of the current food economy and the necessary changes to steer things in a more ecologically healthy direction. His "Open letter to the Farmer-in-Chief" was a beautiful call for the incoming president to engage issues of food security, safety, as well as general nutrition. (For those new to the discussion of food as an ethical issue, this 10 page letter is essential reading.)

The current issue of Mother Jones magazine also includes a fairly in-depth interview of Pollan. I especially commend this interview as a basic primer on many of the interesting issues of the emerging field of 'food ethics'.

If you are interested in Pollan, listen to him here and here. Videos are available here and here. The first of these is a 45 minute with Bill Moyers.

He is now coming to speak at the UBC Farm on June 6. More info is available at the farm website. I have become increasingly aware of the need for these sorts of locally supported small-scale farms as a witness to that which truly sustains us and have found Pollan an important ally in this move. I encourage those within and near Vancouver to consider signing up for the event!

Also, if you are living in Vancouver and haven't gotten to know our local Farmer's Markets, it is about time! Most of these open in May, but there is a winter's farmers market happening here on April 11 and 25.

20th Anniversary of Exxon Valdez

Well, I'm only a few days behind here as Tuesday marked the 20th anniversary of the tragic 1989 Exxon Valdez Oil Spill.

There have been a slew of articles across the web these past days, evidence perhaps of an important and ongoing debate as to the guilt or error of the Texas-based Oil company (who netted $48 billion last year alone) and, more to the point, of the inherent dangers of our world-wide oil addiction. As this brief piece from the NYTimes notes, "Still, there are lots of important questions related to humanity’s 150-year love affair with petroleum. Can expanded oil extraction take place responsibly in Arctic waters? Should the United States drill more in its own waters to rely less on oil from, say, Nigeria?" These important questions generally slip in and out of our collective consciousness, but I hope that the memory of events such as this can help us to re-member a different way of being in the world.


One other interesting feature as noted on the website of the ITOPF (the International Tanker Owners Pollution Federation - yes, this actually exists) is that the Exxon Valdez was not one of the major spills in the recent past - not even in the top 10! In fact, it is #35 in the worst spills on recent record. In first place, and occurring just 10 years prior to Exxon Valdez, is the Atlantic Empress, which collided with another boat in July of 1979 and exploded. The boat caught fire and a vigorous fight was brought to extinguish it. It was then towed towards deeper water by tugboats, but a week later massive explosions erupted again and the oil slick surrounding the boat caught fire. The tow line was dropped and the whole thing burned for another week before sinking into deep water.
See the map below for locations of many of the 'top' spills in recent years.

As the article claims, "Nobody will ever know what was burned and what was dispersed by the sea. No significant shore pollution was recorded on the nearest islands. No impact study was carried out, either by the surrounding countries, or the international community, as awareness regarding marine pollution was less developed then than it is today." This is a significant point. For as surely as the Exxon Valdez spill was major (37,000 TONS of crude is still quite a lot to pour into our waterways, even when compared to its larger counterparts) the attention it attracted was, in part, due to its proximity to our home. The same year as the Exxon spill, another spill double in size occurred just North of the Canary Islands, but it didn't wash over nearly 400 miles of Alaskan shoreline.

Doug Struck, a writer who covered the original spill for The Baltimore Sun has written this article which argues that the effects of the spill continue still 20 years later. "The Trustee Council found 17 of 27 monitored species have not recovered. For example, researchers concluded that the high-pressure hoses used on the beaches did more harm than good. The pressure destroyed interlocking layers of gravel and flushed away fine sediments that scientists now know provided a kind of armor for the beaches during storms, helping to protect clams and mussels. The damage to the shellfish, in turn, slowed the recovery of otters, which feed on the mollusks."

What might we learn? Without getting preachy, I think there are 3 important points to be taken here.

1. As in First Aid, the first rule is "Do No Harm". Our hubris often blinds us to this as we rush in to 'save the planet'. An analogous example hails from our relationships with one another. I have found myself continually making the 'new husband' mistake of rushing in to 'fix' whatever seems to be ailing Roxy before taking time to listen and learn the intricacies and complexities of her day, what and who might be involved, etc. It is rather likewise with our nonhuman neighbors. While technology is a great help - we can disperse quite a bit of oil that would otherwise sit on top of the ocean - we must be slow and careful in utilizing it. What is frightening to me is our capacity to swoop in and miss the bigger picture is even greater in the case of the environment than in our marriages. (The clams and mussels under the sand don't pipe up and say 'hey you idiots, don't power-wash our house or you'll kill us!' whereas my wife has no problem telling me I'm being a jerk and not listening to her.) Listening is key, and learning the languages which are spoken. We need (each of us) to develop what David Orr calls 'ecological literacy'. Perhaps if we have ears to hear even the rocks will cry out.

2. Related to the first point, prevention and good old-fashioned wisdom are paramount. This has immediate import when we hear of plans to open up drilling in the Arctic or in a more local example - the possibility of building a pipeline across BC. We must think carefully 'what is the worst case scenario?' and not let our own hubris - as in 'technology can fix it' - get in the way. Some good old fashioned wisdom is in order here, as always. Any reader of Proverbs ought to know where the beginning of wisdom is found. Recalling our humanness is central to understanding our place in the world.

3. The Creation is a complex entity of which we are but one part. Certainly we hold a special role in creation, but we are prone to cause great pain and confusion if we consider our special place in the creation somehow 'primary' or 'more important' than the whole. We live in an ecosystem - eco- derives from the Greek Oikos, meaning 'household'. The doctrine of creation tells us that God is Creator and we are His creation. He has made all of it, every nook and cranny. (Have a glance at the Psalms or the latter part of Job for starters!) It is truly our household.

Yet it is more, for the 'environment' which 'environs' us is also within us, in some profound ways. Scripture tells us it is out of the very dust of this good creation that we ourselves are made - we are adam (mankind) from adamah (the earth), human from humus. We are, as Loren Wilkinson likes to put it, 'earthlings'. Faithfulness to God involves our coming to know who we our and our place in the world just as we must know who God is and what is His place in our world.

What the Fork?

Well Roxy and I are going away for 10 days for a much-needed rest together.

In the meantime, I thought I'd leave a few links for those interested, as posting will also take a 10-day vacation.

If you haven't visited the Front Page Republic, check out one of the latest articles here. It even includes reference to Aristotle and the virtues! (This is how they describe themselves on the blog: "We come from different backgrounds, live in different places, and have divergent interests, but we’re convinced that scale, place, self-government, sustainability, limits, and variety are key terms with which any fruitful debate about our corporate future must contend.") Definitely worth the read.

Also here are a handful of links passed along from my friend Aaron, some great stuff here and worth browsing regularly. I will be putting these along the side in the Support It section.

What Would Jesus Eat?

The Ethicurean: "Chew the Right Thing."

Sustainable Table. HEAPS of great info and a good blog here.

Local Harvest: an amazing resource in the States that includes a searchable map of farmer's markets, CSA's, and local foodies.

Enjoy.

To be organic or not to be....

One concern we all have when buying our groceries is price.

Notice, however, that price is just that - one concern.

Not the concern. But one of many concerns, to my mind.


Certainly the quality of the food items ought to be a consideration. This is the case both in terms of nutrition of the general items (should I have blueberries or doughnuts?) and the specific items themselves (this soy milk has lots of added ingredients which I cannot pronounce, but this one does not, etc).

Somewhere in this equation we also ought to consider the quality of item in terms of its production. This is where the label of 'organic' most clearly comes into focus.

The consumer-culture has largely hijacked organic to mean something which is a benefit to ME. (If I buy this I consume less pesticides.) While this is certainly the case, we ought to remember that the Organic label is aimed to indicate something about the products production. This banana, for instance, was produced without any chemical pesticides. So, yes, it means you will not be consuming any pesticides. But it also means that the ground upon which these fruits grew did not consume any pesticides, nor did the farmers who labored over the fruits we now enjoy.


As Roxy and I have been drawn more and more into the discussion of eating organic food even more, we are ever aware of the cost differences. Oftentimes we don't purchase all organics, but will have to pick and choose some things to buy organic and some not to. (This does often involve a consideration of how many food miles our food has traveled, but more on that later! For more on calculating food miles try this calculator.)

In the meantime, my good friend Aaron has passed along this excellent resource from The Environmental Working Group. They rate individual fruits and vegetables in terms of typical pesticide exposure. (For instance, bananas are exposed to less pesticides than grapes because of their thick skins and distance from the soil. Their methodology and a summary can be found here).

Here are their worst top ten, which show the highest rates of pesticides:
1. Peaches
2. Apples
3. Sweet Bell Peppers
4. Celery
5. Nectarines
6. Strawberries
7. Cherries
8. Lettuce
9. Grapes (imported)
10. Pears

What this can also help us do is determine which fruits we ought to always buy organic, and which we can be more relaxed about. But I encourage us to keep in mind the total health of the ecosystem as we do this. Eating Organic is about much more than fad dieting. It is about embodying a way of life that is mindful of our neighbors, even as we are mindful of ourselves.

Australian scientists to tackle bovine gas

I've only been married for a short while now (almost 2 years), but discovered quite early in the game that I had inherited a whole new set of social manners. It is actually not appropriate, I learned, to lift one side of your bum to fart at the dinner table, (yes even if it makes it quieter). Nor is it acceptable to pull out your hanky and blow your nose before dessert. What once seemed to me the freedom and dignity of my earthly existence now proves to contain disastrous long-term consequences for my marriage.

Such is the case with our bovine friends.



Australia announced this week to invest $26 million in seeking a way to lower cow emissions. Yes, cow emissions. Yes, 26 million. It seems as climate change takes greater priority among world leaders and possible consequences loom on the horizon, beef-friendly countries are seeking solutions now. (Find the official statement here.) Australians are not the first to study this. Argentina has taken the approach of strapping large plastic tanks to each cow to collect their burps. This might seem silly, but when your country has approximately 40 million people and 55 million cows, you might think again. As climate change becomes more and more pressing around the world, many are surprised to discover that the methane produced by your Big Mac contributes 15-18% of global emissions (that is more than your Honda.) In fact, the 18% of global emissions exceeds that of cars, planes, and all transport put together, according to this UN study entitled Livestock's Long Shadow.

Some scientists are even experimenting with garlic as a way of reducing cow flatulence. Well, I'd like to find that garlic for a little testing of my own. My favorite report, however, was from this Times article, which claims, "Scientists at the Rowett Research Institute in Aberdeen say they have developed a diet that has done the most to reduce the amount of methane produced by cows."

They could've all saved time and money by speaking with my wife.

hmmm... biofuels...

I'll surely write more on this later, but in reading Pollan's interview I recalled this (funny? sad? ironic? truth-telling?) piece from the Seattle Post last year...

Michael Pollan interview

I found this story today in my Google Reader and thought it must be passed on.

Michael Pollan is one of the most eloquent writers concerning issues agricultural. His latest book, In Defense of Food, is a serious call towards a more mindful meal. He has also written an excellent letter back in October 2008 to the incoming "Farmer in Chief". This is by far the best introduction to the mind of Pollan.

This interview from Mother Jones is a great one. Here is an excerpt from Pollan:

"It's a dead end to try and eliminate subsidies, because then you get all of America's farmers, who have political power out of all proportion of their number, unified against change. Right now the incentives are to produce as much as possible, whatever the costs to the environment and our health. But you can imagine another set of assumptions, so that they're getting incentives to sequester carbon. Or clean the water that leaves their farm, or for the quality, not the quantity, of the food they're growing."

As I read more about this topic each day, it seems some good steps are being taken to move in the opposite direction, even in the USDA - such as the creation of a new office of "Ecosystem Services and Markets", and a new pilot project which provides funding for midwest farmers to plant "such vegetables as cucumbers, green peas, lima beans, pumpkins, snap beans, sweet corn, or tomatoes" on its base acres. The history of Farm Bill's gets a little complex on this point, but it is positive to see any movement away from high commodity crops (such as corn and soybeans - the two most heavily subsidized by the USDA) in support of green goodies.

The hope for a renewed Dept of Agriculture is chronicled here and here.

"Low Carbon: High Growth" - report on Climate Change and Central America

Well my aims in this blog do extend further than posting 100 page reports, but upon reading this story, I felt it was worth pointing out the surprising deal of synergy between the findings and recommendations of such organizations as the UNEP and World Bank. Find the full report, entitled "Low Carbon High Growth: Latin America Response to Climate Change" here.

It lists these four major factors of concern for Latin America: "(a) the warming and eventual disabling of mountain ecosystems in the Andes; (b) the bleaching of coral reefs leading to an anticipated total collapse of the coral biome in the Caribbean basin; (c) the damage to vast stretches of wetlands and associated coastal systems in the Gulf of Mexico; and (d) the risk of forest dieback in the Amazon basin." (pg. 2)

What is encouraging is to find an organization such as the World Bank (alternative reading: "The Man") urging a move towards environmental protection. These are not granola-eating pot-smoking tie-dye-donning ideologues (what my father-in-law might call 'damned socialists'), these are capitalists through and through. They are not naive concerning the serious challenges facing us economically. But they are thoroughly convinced that the way forward must take into account the long-term health of the ecosystems upon which human flourishing depends AND will require the input of policy-makers, consumers, and producers.

Consider the following quote.

" If leaders at the national and international levels are visionary, they can avoid falling into the trap of sacrificing environmental sustainability to short-term macroeconomic necessities, and can take advantage of opportunities to address climate change concerns. In particular, policies and programs to address today’s pressing problems can be designed and implemented with a long-term horizon. Sometimes, these decisions can be win-win. But sometimes, there will be tradeoffs.  For example, private investment in, and consumption of, clean energy will be stimulated by a relative increase in the price of fossil fuels; this can be encouraged through a combination of regulations, taxes, carbon-trading schemes, and subsidies. But making firms pay to pollute and forcing households to consume more expensive, if cleaner, energy are not popular in times of economic recession. Tilting private sector activity in a sustainable fashion toward lowcarbon choices thus calls for carefully managed political compromises and sound judgment on the part of policy makers to ensure that long-term considerations are not neglected for political expediency..." (pg. x)

A few notes in response:

1. The call for leaders to think long-term is a necessary component to moving forward.

2. The relationship between private investment and government stimulus is a tender one, but a two-way street.  

3. The idea that 'the market' will simply 'fix' things without any input or stimulus is naive at best and damaging at worst.  That this report calls for "carefully managed political compromises and sound judgment on the part of policy makers to ensure that long-term considerations are not neglected for political expediency" ought to alert us to the dangers of placing the self and its desires at the center of our policy.

4. The socioeconomic well-being of peoples around the world is ultimately dependent upon the health of the ecosystems in and upon which we live.  If this seems odd, try to give up air, water, and food for a few days.

5.  Once again, the area likely to be hit the hardest, as we've already seen, is agriculture...

"Climate change is likely to also cause severe negative impacts on socioeconomic systems. Some of these socioeconomic impacts will be due to the direct effects of climate on human activities, while others will be intermediated through the impact that the climate will have on ecosystems which provide economically significant services. Among the economic sectors, the
one likely to suffer the most direct and largest impact from gradual changes in temperature and precipitation is agriculture." (pg. 8-9, italics mine)

UNEP "Environmental Food Crises" - an important report

At a meeting last week of the UNEP Governing Council and Global Ministerial Environment Forum (yes thats a mouthful) in Nairobi, Kenya, an important and powerful document was released entitled "The Environmental Food Crisis". The report can be found electronically here. Or you can also download the 104-page report in its entirety as a pdf file.

The focus of this report has been in the news for the last year or two as a number of factors (the report names "speculation in food stocks, extreme weather events, low cereal stocks, growth in biofuels competing for cropland and high oil prices" along with the loss of agricultural lands due to development pg. 6) have collapsed the global food status quo and drive more than 110 million people (in 2008 alone) into poverty, while leaving an additional 44 million undernourished. (pg. 13) (In case you weren't aware the 'extreme poverty' threshold has been valued at US $1.25 a day - about 50 cents less than my cup of coffee.)

Reports like this threaten our humanity and livelihood. They also threaten the common notion that caring for the environment is different from caring for the poor. When I consider how my own food choices implicate me in such systems of injustice, I am reminded of passages such as this one from the Prophets. Truly "The earth mourns" and "lies polluted under its inhabitants; for they have transgressed laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant."

For more news about this UN report try here and here. What these reports claim is that the changes which most make sense for the earth - smaller-scale organic operations, less waste of water and loss of topsoil - make the most sense for its inhabitants. The first report is of particular interest to me as I recall this same picture almost daily at my own University.

MacIntyre and intelligent action (and reading too)

Chris Tilling, over at Chrisendom has recently commented on a brilliant piece of Alasdair MacIntyre's After Virtue. He relates this post to the John Piper-Tom Wright debate over justification. It is a great thought and the post can be found here.

Here is the quote in full:

"I am standing waiting for a bus and the young man standing next to me suddenly says: 'The name of the common wild duck is Histrionicus histrionicus histrionicus.' There is no problem as to the meaning of the sentence he uttered: the problem is, how to answer the question, what was he doing in uttering it? Suppose he just uttered such sentences at random intervals; this would be one possible form of madness. We would render his action of utterance intelligible if one of the following turned out to be true. He has mistaken me for someone who yesterday had approached him in the library and asked: 'Do you by any chance know the Latin name of the common wild duck?' Or he has just come from a session with his psychotherapist who has urged him to break down his shyness by talking to strangers. Or he is a Soviet spy waiting at a prearranged rendez-vous and uttering the ill-chosen code sentence which will identify him to his contact. In each case the act of utterance become intelligible by finding its place in a narrative." (p. 210) (italics mine)

What MacIntyre so beautifully articulates is the role of context in shaping the intelligibility of action. While I think there is some fruit to be found in deconstruction and the sort of postmodern linguistic turn, what it fails wholly to grasp is the embedded nature of language and action. We are not completely adrift in a sea of language, no matter how much it may appear the case. Neither are we completely adrift in embodied action. The great gift of MacIntyre (and the whole theological school of Hauerwas et al. that followed him) is the realization that narrative plays a vital role in discourse.

Much of our misunderstanding, therefore, (and thanks to Tilling in naming this to be the case with Wright and Piper) is not over words themselves, but over the narrative context within which those words are given meaning. After all, we can read it as plain as can be "the righteousness of God". But as soon as we ponder what these words might mean within the context of Paul's letter to the Romans, or that of First Century Judaism and Christianity, we are onto a whole different topic. The same emerges in our readings of Genesis and Revelation. What are we to make of such potent imagery? Can we read these as simply as we can pick up a newspaper or must we immerse ourselves in another world of thought and metaphor to make sense of things?

I think this is why Wright is such essential reading, for he navigates these challenges as deftly as anyone. (If you haven't yet, stop now and go read his New Testament and the People of God parts one and two!) The task of faithful exegesis must begin from this point - the thought world of the Biblical writers and original readers - and ask these sorts of questions or else it does become adrift. It must be willing to listen and to wait and to press further into a narrative that is not, in the first instance, simply our own. Only from this point can we begin to grasp 'the way' and follow it.

science and the industry watchdog

Well I've long been concerned over the 'purity of science'. I mean, surely there is a pot of gold at the end of the rainbow for every decent discovery? So perhaps is the case with the piles of money thrown into pesticides, genetically modified seed, and many other 'discoveries' which make agriculture more 'efficient'. Where, however, does the health of the ecosystems (upon which our own health depends) factor in shaping these findings? As Wendell Berry notes in Life is a Miracle, "There are scientists, one must suppose, who know all about atoms or molecules or genes, or galaxies or planets or stars, but who do not know where they are geographically, historically, or ecologically." Developing a way of life which orients and shapes us to live faithfully as creatures in and with creation is one of the major burdens of this blog. The fact that billion-dollar corporations have little interest in supporting such a way of life is regrettable, but must be honestly faced. The fact that we participate in these billion-dollar industries every day through our consumption and lifestyles ought to frame a call to repentance.

If you think this is all conspiracy theory, read the latest story here about scientists who are forced to write articles anonymously in fear of losing their research funding (much of which comes directly from large corporations).

To my mind, this is one of the great evils of our age. It will be a glorious day when our Churches begin to pray against this sort of death-dealing evil and find alternative ways of being human in a groaning creation.

"May something like scales fall from our eyes..."

Back in the Action

Greetings web-folk,

after a long silence, I have emerged energized and excited to begin posting again. I have also decided to begin including noteworthy articles concerning the Creation. I receive several daily updates from important environmental news agencies and magazines, and think it would be fruitful to pull some of the juicy bits together and respond in kind.

Check me out again soon for more fun stuff!