Laudato Si Sunday Reflection: Enmeshed in God's creation

This week's reflection is brought to you by
Isaiah 42:1-4, 6-7.

O God,
Your words to the suffering servant
in the book of Isaiah
can also apply to each one of us:

You are my servant,
whom I uphold,
my chosen,
in whom my soul delights;
I have put my spirit in you
to bring forth justice to my earth.

You will not break those who are bruised
and you will not extinguish any small hope;
you will faithfully bring forth justice.

I am God,
I have called you in righteousness,
I have taken you by the hand and kept you;
I have given you your gifts and talents
to be a light in my world,
to open the eyes of those who cannot see my way,
to free those imprisoned by fear and darkness."

You call us to be mindful
O God,
of your ways in our world,
of how we are enmeshed in your creation.

Help us to hear
and do
what you ask of us!

We need you,
and you tell us that the world needs us
to become your action
for the good of all.

Help us to work together
to bring all of creation
to your light,
your hope,
your freedom.

+Amen.

* * * * * * * 

God is always calling us from our problems toward solutions, and that's what the rest of Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home is all about. Not that they will be easy solutions. The reason Pope Francis's letter to the world is something of a hard sell is that, if we are to make it work, it is the wealthy 8% of the world's population who will have to overhaul our lives with an eye to what the planet requires for the survival. We are the ones who will have to rethink our jet-setting vacations, recreational vehicles and over-sized homes. And it comes down to the wire -- will we change willingly, or will the increasingly dangerous climate conditions force change upon us? Australia's wildfires are yet another wake up call that we can't afford to ignore!

How many of us are willing to sacrifice for the common good, and to reduce our ecological footprints so we can live more sustainably? This week we are reflecting on paragraphs 137 to 142 of Laudato Si, which can be accessed by clicking here and scrolling down.

Before I get into the Pope's discussion of an integral ecology, I'd like to share once again a little piece I came across from Australia's Rolling Stone Magazine (Issue 771, February 2016). David Suzuki, our Canadian environmental scientist and global climate change crusader, an avowed atheist, noted that many of our planet's issues have been separated into different categories, to be handled by different agencies. Suzuki was thrilled by Pope Francis' encyclical, commenting that,

We are enmeshed...

 ...we [environmental activists] act as though [hunger, poverty, social justice, environment] are separate issues. And the Pope doesn't separate them: he says, 'We've spent all our time focused on two relationships: our human relationship with God, and our relationship with each other. But there is a third relationship, and that's our relationship with the rest of Creation.' Thank you, Francis. It's an astounding thing to come out of the Catholic freakin' Church!

Suzuki is right -- the beauty of the Pope's letter to the world is that it underlines, over and over again, the importance of realizing that everything we do impacts life on this planet in some way, and that there are no "separate issues." We are enmeshed in creation, in our world's many issues, in each other's lives.

Paragraph 137 begins with the refrain that everything is closely interrelated (we hear it twice more in these 6 paragraphs!), followed with the reminder that we need to take into account "every aspect of the global crisis" using an integral ecology. In other words, we must look at what is happening to the environment through the lenses of science, culture, politics, technology, faith, health, resource use, equality and solidarity, climate change, economics, everything.

Facing up to the challenge of employing an integral ecology requires "reflection and debate about the conditions required for the life and survival of society" (paragraph 138), not to mention the rest of creation. "Nature cannot be regarded as something separate from ourselves or as a mere setting in which we live. We are part of nature, included in it and thus in constant interaction with it" (paragraph 139). And the crises we face are both social and environmental, demanding "an integrated approach to combating poverty, restoring dignity to the excluded, and at the same time protecting nature." If we can do those three things, our ecology becomes wholistic or integral.

Paragraph 140 notes that researchers have an important role in determining the environmental impacts of human activity, and that they must have the academic freedom to help us to understand the balance of the ecosystems that make up our planet because otherwise, we can't begin to live sustainably. We humans are pretty good at seeing the things that directly impact us, but wear blinders when it comes to impacts on other creatures essential to the world's survival. And often we don't see impacts until much further down the road. Case in point? The past and present use of DDT and other pesticides -- that we now know are found in our own bodies, though they were only supposed to suppress certain "pests."

Pope Francis is trying to make us realize that the economy's "predictable reactions and... standardization with the aim of simplifying procedures and reducing costs" can no longer be the driving force in our earth's development (paragraph 141). The quality life for all creatures and the human institutions that protect justice, peace and freedom for all of creation need to be given higher priority than the many financial and political forces that have overseen our planet and allowed it to fall into ruin.

One major problem, according to paragraph 142, is that lack of respect for the law has become more and more common at all levels. The pope and friends cite the continuing destruction of forests in countries that have clear forest protection legislation, and the importing of drugs to affluent societies from poor regions that suffer because of the drug trade. If we follow world news at all, we can probably name dozens of other examples of international, national, and local laws that are being ignored all the time, or situations where industry or politics find and exploit loopholes in various social and environmental regulations.

It makes me happy that more and more, activists are discovering and speaking up about the places where laws are ignored to the detriment of our planet -- and that average citizens are getting involved through social media campaigns. But what really needs to happen is that we all need to develop an integral way of thinking at all levels, all the time.

We've just begun a new decade, and as I see it, our challenge as a human race is to see our lives with integral ecology in mind. Almost every choice we make as human beings, whether we realize it or not, has an impact on our planet. For example, my choices this morning have included what to eat for breakfast (what do my food choices cost my planet?) how to prepare it (how is my energy use impacting the environment?), what I will wear (how has it been produced, and who or what is affected by that?) and how I will get to church (can I reduce my fossil fuel emissions?) Seeing how we are enmeshed in the bigger picture takes effort and practice, but it can certainly help us to live more sustainably.

In the 2020s, we must all ask ourselves: How am I enmeshed in God's creation? How can I live more sustainably? How do I fit into an integral ecology? And how can I bring others to this kind of mindfulness?

Laudato Si Sunday Reflection: Slowing down, using less

Today's reflection is brought to you by
Jeremiah 17:5-8.

For too long,
O God,
we have believed
more in ourselves
than really trusted in you.

And now we see
evidence of our own foolishness
everywhere we look.

In turning away from you
and the sacredness
of all that you have made,
we are turning parts of our planet
into salt lands
where we can no longer live.

Help us,
O God,
to reverse what we have done.

Slow the desertification
of our spirits,
of our earth.

Set our hearts and minds
on your streams
of beauty, goodness, and truth
so that we see with your eyes --
that everything
and everyone
is sacred
and deserves our loving care.

Then all of your creation
will be like a tree planted by water,
sending out its roots by the stream.
It shall not fear when heat comes,
and its leaves shall stay green;
in the year of drought it is not anxious,
and it does not cease to bear fruit. (Jer 17:8)

+Amen.

* * * * * * *

This week I've been looking back at paragraphs 17-21 of Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home, Chapter One: What is happening to our common home (the entire text can be accessed by clicking here). It's the beginning of a frank assessment of what's actually happening to our environment before getting into the theology and philosophy that could be helpful in determining how to prevent further damage to the only home we have.

Right off the bat in paragraph 18, Pope Francis and friends name "rapidification" as a factor contributing to the planet's problems. Basically, change is happening more rapidly than we or the earth can actually adapt, and keeping up to the pace is stressing everyone and everything. Human desire tends always toward bigger, bolder, brighter, and better... but in our obsession with our desires, we forget that small, gentle, quiet and simple ways are often much better for our souls and bodies.

For too long, we have gone along with an "irrational confidence in progress and human abilities." The good news is that some of us are starting to see the problems caused when we think we know everything we need to know, and by living in such a hurry all the time. I'll never forget hearing Canadian scientist and TV personality, David Suzuki, at a teacher's conference in 1989 where he talked about the fallacy of perpetual growth. For me, it was the beginning of critical thinking about the pace of North American life and the finite nature of our planet's resources.

Pope Francis is inviting us to "become painfully aware, to dare to turn what is happening to the world into our own personal suffering and thus to discover what each of us can do about it (paragraph 19)." With our planet's declining health and climate change in the news more and more, we can no longer sweep our environmental problems under the carpet and go on as if nothing is wrong. We have the power to stop turning our planet into salt lands by choosing to live more simply, using what we have as well as we can, and demanding that the products we choose are recyclable, or better yet, wasteless (I'm thinking of the endless over-packaging of so many store items).

Back in October, I attended a Zero Waste Workshop led by Bea Johnson. I was well aware that it's possible to avoid many single use items like plastic straws, water bottles, grocery bags and single use coffee cups (I no longer go for groceries/coffee with friends unless I have my reusable bags/mug with me). But Bea and her family take it to a whole other level, and since her workshop, I've been refilling containers at Earth's General Store and Bulk Barn more regularly, and looking for more ways that I can reduce the packaging in our lives. Check out Bea's website and the video below to see Bea show us what's possible...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=6N-rPTJVk80

So how are you going to make less of a mess of our planet in the week ahead? How can you encourage those around you to create less garbage and trouble for our sister, Mother Earth?

For the sake of Paradise

My friend, Allison, posted this picture from outside her home on Facebook yesterday morning with the caption, "Uhhhhh, anyone know about this?"

Today I have learned that Allie has lost her home and business in Paradise, California, to the latest wildfire in that state. And oh, my heart is breaking for her. Of course, she's the kind of person who, while she will grieve her losses, is also grateful that she and her husband, Mike, were able to relocate to the home of a friend with 4 elderly friend and family members, and their 4 dogs. They are all safe, thanks be to God. They are putting a brave face on it, and will get through it all somehow, no doubt.

Most of us live far from these kinds of climate tragedies, and fool ourselves into believing that we are safe from this kind of thing, so we go on with our lives as though nothing needs to change. But if we really think about it, climate change could easily wipe out our own neighbourhoods with a wildfire, a storm, or a longterm electrical outage in deep winter. Call me a pessimist if you like, but it's the truth.

I am too far away to be of much help to Allie, who has many friends to support her in the U.S. Of course, I send my thoughts and prayers, and I've made a contribution to a Go Fund Me page for the family. Beyond that, I'm writing this post today to encourage everyone, everyone, to please think about every little thing you can do that will help to reduce the climate change impacts that create these kinds of events. Maybe even think about supporting an environmental agency or organization if you can.

The thing is, we all live in Paradise, though we seem to take it for granted every day. Our beautiful planet needs us to really appreciate it, to take climate change seriously, and to live much MORE simply, sustainably, and carbon-neutrally than we do at this moment. We're too late to prevent the burning of Allie's paradise in Paradise, California, but if we get on it NOW and make some serious sacrifices when it comes to our own use of fossil fuels and other resources, perhaps we can save the rest of the Paradise in which we all live. Call me an optimist if you like, but it's the truth.

Sunday Reflection on a Monday: God's true sustainability

Today's reflection is brought to you by 1 Kings 19:4-8 and John 6:51a.

Sometimes I feel like Elijah,
O God,
because the world gets to be a bit much.

Last week's blue skies obliterated
by grey smoke.

Wildfires, floods and earthquakes.

The inhumanity of some human beings.

It is enough
to make me want to lie down under my own broom tree and say,
"It is enough."

Elijah was right --
we are no better than our ancestors.

Our continuing path
of ignorance,
greed,
and over-consumption
has brought us to the point
that our planet
and many of its peoples
are choking because of our excesses.

But today you give me a clear blue sky,
as if to say,
"Get up and eat,
otherwise the journey will be too much for you."

Human beings aren't so good at sustainability,
but you are.

You offer yourself to sustain us
through all the good things of our world,
blue skies included.

You send prophets with plans
to help us care
for widows, orphans and strangers in our midst
and lately,
you bring to our attention
many who are calling us
to live in harmony with one another
and all of your creatures.

Do we hear them?

You give us your life and spirit
so that we may walk in your strength
for those mystical 40 days and nights
in spite of the troubles,
heartaches,
and ecological disasters
that wear us down.

Help us to listen to your wise ones.

Make us willing to sacrifice
all that makes our world unhealthy.

Help us to move beyond lip service
to your true sustainability,
O Creator of this life-filled planet.

Show us how to do what must be done.

Teach us to change bad habits for good,
even if they're less convenient.

Remind us often
that you are with us,
ministering to us
through small signs of hope
and the encouragement of those around us.

Come what may,
whoever eats of this bread
will live forever.

+Amen.

Simple Suggestion #268... Drive smarter

Did you hear about the World Scientists' Warning to Humanity: A Second Notice in the news yesterday? Being released on what was the statutory Remembrance Day holiday for many people, its timing wasn't the best, as often happens with these very important news items.

Basically, 15,364 scientists from 184 countries around the globe (the most co-signers of a journal article ever recorded) signed a joint statement (please, go ahead and read it by clicking here or on its title above -- it's a quick and informative read). The Warning's signatories are doing what they can to push us, earth's human citizens, toward reducing greenhouse gas emissions, restoring damaged ecosystems, limiting human population growth, and reining in material consumption. They share information about our planet's losses since the first warning in 1992, and tell us:

To prevent widespread misery and catastrophic biodiversity loss, humanity must practice a more environmentally sustainable alternative to business as usual. This prescription was well articulated by the world's leading scientists 25 years ago, but in most respects, we have not heeded their warning. Soon it will be too late to shift course away from our failing trajectory, and time is running out. We must recognize, in our day-to-day lives and in our governing institutions, that Earth with all its life is our only home.

In understanding that Earth is our only home and that it is in serious trouble (as Pope Francis noted in his June 2015 letter to the world, Laudato Si:On Care for Our Common Home), we need to make some serious sacrifices. The scientists' warning offers many suggestions for transitioning to a more sustainable world, and encourages us to look at how we can live more sustainably to reduce our impact on our over-stressed planet and to work from the grass roots to bring about change. Which changes can we make right now?

One thing that we have done as a family was to give up certain conveniences, including our second car. It's been challenging at times when people are going in different directions, but living in a city, we are fortunate to have transit or taxis (or family and friends to help us out on occasion) when too many things are happening at once. We've also forgone attending the odd event just because it wasn't possible to make our single family vehicle bilocate.

But for many people in our spacious and vehicle-oriented country, it's not possible to give up personal transportation. So for those of us who have vehicles, a number of organizations (including the City of Edmonton) have joined with an online program called the Smart Drive Challenge, a program designed to teach us how to be more efficient with the fossil fuels we do use. Click on the highlighted link above to check it out.

Of course, even better than taking the Smart Drive Challenge would be to give up vehicles altogether -- like my friend Terry has. She's been car-less for years, has saved a fortune in insurance, gas, maintenance and registration fees, and only rents a vehicle once in a while for those things she can't do on foot or by public transportation. I wonder how many fewer greenhouse gases she's responsible for. Terry proves that it IS possible to go one step further than driving smarter, and simply give up having a car in Edmonton for most days of the year. But make no mistake, it is a sacrifice. She's at the mercy of our transit schedules a lot of the time, and bus service here seems to end at the supper hour in many cases.

Going car-less is a really radical idea, but somehow, I suspect that our 15,364 scientists would approve. If that's a bit too radical for you, I'll bet they'd give a secondary thumbs up to the Smart Drive Challenge. Try it!

Simple Suggestion #108 revisited... Naturalize your wardrobe

After a shopping trip for some cotton camisoles went nowhere on the weekend, I got into an interesting clothing-related conversation at work yesterday. A couple of my colleagues were commenting on North Americans' clothing, and how surprised they were to see people going to church in jeans and t-shirts, or walking the streets in sweat pants. According to one of my friends, in Zambia, people get gussied up just to go to and from work because it's important to look good even if you're a labourer for most of the day. For many people, a good wardrobe is a must, and wearing the same clothing over and over isn't a good choice.

But the industry that drives people to always wear the latest fashion isn't sustainable. The earth would be much better off if we had fewer clothes of better quality and wore them until they wore out, never mind what's trendy. After sorting through bags and bags of donated clothing at the Society of St. Vincent de Paul over the years, I came to a place where too much is TOO MUCH. My wardrobe is very simple, and I'm sure people have seen every item I wear many times over, but does that really matter? Not when the health of our planet is at stake. If everyone on earth buys a new spring, summer, fall and winter wardrobe, it won't be long until our planet is uninhabitable!

It's also a good idea to live in natural fibres as much as possible. For one thing, they breathe better, and for another, when they get to the end of their lives (or mine), if they end up in a landfill, they will biodegrade in a way that polyester and other artificial fibres don't. In the earlier days of humanity, everyone wore clothing that was hand-made from plants or fleece and skins of animals, but now we're covering ourselves with petroleum-derived materials that shed microfibres into our ecosystems. And our ecosystems are us... as this new video from the Story of Stuff people makes clear.

These days, almost everything we wear is processed in one way or another, so it takes extra effort to find clothing made from wool, cotton, hemp, and other natural fibres that aren't chemically treated in ways that wreck our environment at their beginnings, or aren't made by people trapped in poor working conditions. But if we can find it, clothing manufactured using sustainable, people-friendly methods is often of such good quality that it lasts longer than the unsustainable equivalents, if you can even call them equivalents. Another option is buying natural-fibre clothing second-hand instead of creating consumer demand for new items.

I've spent part of my afternoon today looking at "sustainable clothing" websites, and there still aren't enough retailers for natural fibre fair trade apparel as far as I can see. So, as the video says, we need to let the clothing industry know that we want more sustainable options, and it probably wouldn't hurt to let some of the more sustainable clothing producers out there know that we appreciate their efforts. The powers that be can't read our minds, but it seems they notice when we vote with our pocket books. Right, Ivanka Trump?

P.S. Looking for more Simple Suggestions? Try here.

Laudato Si: Sunday Reflection #38... The market ain't magic

I have to admit this Pentecost Sunday that it's getting harder and harder to put in the time to do these reflections now that the weather is fine and the garden is ready to be planted. But we're so close to finishing these Sunday readings that I'm not about to quit. We're into good stuff!

This week's reading from Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home, paragraphs 189-193, is the first half of a section entitled Politics and Economy in Dialogue for Human Fulfilment. It can be accessed by clicking here and scrolling down.

"In view of the common good, there is urgent need for politics and economics to enter into a frank dialogue in the service of life, especially human life" says the beginning of paragraph 189. Augghhh! This business of differentiating human life from that of the rest of the planet has created the "us vs. them" attitude that has allowed human beings to dominate rather than cooperate with creation. Here it would seem that the folks who wrote the encyclical with Pope Francis are forgetting the chorus of the song -- "everything is connected and/or interrelated." I'd like to erase that "especially human life" at the end of the sentence. Isn't it enough to be in the service of life?

I do go off on tangents, sorry. The point of paragraph 189 is that too often, necessary production of goods to keep life going gets waylaid by political or economic machinations, leading to "overproduction of some commodities, with unnecessary impact on the environment and with negative results on regional economies." The financial bubbles created by such production create a false economy, but Pope Francis suggests that "it is the real economy which makes diversification and improvement in production possible, helps companies to function well, and enables small and medium businesses to develop and create employment."

I like paragraph 190, in which Pope Francis notes (using different words than I will, so you'll want to read the whole thing) that the environment, not the economy, is the bottom line -- "...we need to reject a magical conception of the market."

Yes! Yes we do!

The Pope also asks, "Is it realistic to hope that those who are obsessed with maximizing profits will stop to reflect on the environmental damage they will leave behind for future generations?" In paragraph 190, the Pope could be writing his own adult version of Dr. Seuss' classic children's book, The Lorax.

If you've never read The Lorax, I'd recommend it -- it's the story of a little guy who lives in an idyllic place full of truffula trees, singing swomee swans, humming fish and little brown barbaloots who eat truffula fruit, until the Once-ler comes along, founds something like a corporation to turn the trees into thneeds (some sort of all-purpose trendy item that everyone wants -- in every colour of the rainbow). Of course, the Lorax sees the decimation of the truffula forests and the ensuing decline in the health and happiness of his animal friends. He tries to call a halt to the Once-ler's plans, but the Once-ler is too busy to listen. So environmental devastation results, the Lorax has to send away his loveable wildlife friends (it's a children's book -- extinction would be too harsh), the gorgeous green landscape turns many depressing shades of grey, and the Lorax sadly lifts himself into the sky by the seat of his pants, leaving the Once-ler all alone with a single word -- "Unless."

"Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot,
nothing is going to get better. It's not,"

the regretful hermit of a Once-ler tells a young visitor to his despoiled land as he hands over the last truffula tree seed. Written in 1971, The Lorax is the earliest environmental fable I can think of besides the Garden of Eden and Noah's ark.

In paragraph 191 the Pope notes that "some" accuse "others" (read: environmentalists) of "irrationally attempting to stand in the way of progress and human development just as the Lorax tried to make the Once-ler see the folly of his ways. But really, it isn't irrationality -- it's common sense that "we need to grow in the conviction that a decrease in the pace of production and consumption can at times give rise to another form of progress and development." Growth can no longer be our highest ideal -- but sustainability can!

The Pope and friends hold up "productive development" as an ideal in paragraph 192 because it "offers the fullest possibilities to human ingenuity to create and innovate, while at the same time protecting the environment and creating more sources of employment." Sustainable development means being aware of the many possibilities for growth, but letting some of them go in favour of protecting creation, using less, employing the ideas of "reusing, revamping and recycling," and increasing the efficiency of our energy use, to name just a few possibilities.

Paragraph 193 indicates that growth needs to be balanced or contained "by setting some reasonable limits and even retracing our steps before it is too late... the time has come to accept decreased growth in some parts of the world, in order to provide resources for other places to experience healthy growth."

If we look at the development in our world, we can see that in North America, we've had more than our fair share of growth. So how do we encourage more sober lifestyles, reduce our energy consumption and improve our efficiency as was suggested in the quote from Pope Benedict XVI toward the end of the paragraph?

We might have to employ a word that people in North America have forgotten in our rush to have it all -- we might have to sacrifice our over-abundant standard of living by forgoing some of the conveniences and experiences to which we've come to believe we are entitled. We might have to un-brain-wash ourselves from thinking that the newest, trendiest, fastest, biggest, smartest, brightest items on the market will fulfil all our desires. We might have to realize that unlimited market growth is limiting our ability to live in harmony with our sister, Mother Earth because it demands too many resources. We might have to remember how to be happy with less.

In other words, we might have to live by the fruits of the Spirit that we are celebrating on this Pentecost Sunday, and apply them to our care for our common home -- love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control (Galatians 5: 22).

A stronger desire for these fruits in our lives, especially that last one, will help creation more than any market ever has... don't you think?

*******

A prayer for our earth

All-powerful God, you are present in the whole universe

and in the smallest of your creatures.

You embrace with your tenderness all that exists.

Pour out upon us the power of your love,

that we may protect life and beauty.

Fill us with peace, that we may live

as brothers and sisters, harming no one.

O God of the poor,

help us to rescue the abandoned and forgotten of this earth,

so precious in your eyes.

Bring healing to our lives,

that we may protect the world and not prey on it,

that we may sow beauty, not pollution and destruction.

Touch the hearts

of those who look only for gain

at the expense of the poor and the earth.

Teach us to discover the worth of each thing,

to be filled with awe and contemplation,

to recognize that we are profoundly united

with every creature

as we journey towards your infinite light.

We thank you for being with us each day.

Encourage us, we pray, in our struggle

for justice, love and peace.

+AMEN.

(A prayer for our earth and all quotations from Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home © Libreria Editrice Vaticana)

Next up: Redefining 'progress'

Have your say on Canada's Climate Change Strategy

Back at the beginning of September, the Alberta Government was looking for input toward the Paris Climate talks... and now the Federal Government is asking what Canadians think should be done to mitigate the effects of climate change which clearly is already happening.

With wildfires raging up near Fort McMurray, there's never a better time than the present to come up with a plan to handle climate change, which causes the disruption in our weather patterns that led to our warm, dry Alberta winter that fuelled the disaster up north. 88,000 people are still waiting to hear when and if they can return home, and the fires are still burning, adding to carbon emissions and causing further weather instability.

So if you have any ideas about how we can cut our fossil fuel emissions, change our lifestyles for the better and reduce climate change, now is the time to share them with the powers that be. Try thinking outside your usual boxes -- as Einstein liked to say, "We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them."

Click here to offer your ideas on our National Climate Change Strategy. Go for it!

Laudato Si: Sunday Reflection #27... An integral way of thinking

The last few weeks of these reflections have been a pretty tough slog, I'll admit. I laugh at myself because I hated writing essays as a student -- and here, what have I done but set myself the challenge of an essay a week on some darn difficult topics! But it's all worth it if it spreads the ideas of Laudato Si even just a little bit further. Thanks to all of you for reading along with me as I go -- knowing that you are participating in this project keeps me motivated.

I'm actually looking forward to reflecting on the rest of Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home, because the second half of the encyclical is going beyond the problems toward solutions. Not that they will be easy solutions. The reason Pope Francis's letter to the world is something of a hard sell is that, if we are to make it work, it is the wealthy 8% of the world's population who will have to overhaul our lives with an eye to what the planet requires for the survival of life. We are the ones who will have to rethink our jet-setting vacations, recreational vehicles and oversized homes. And it comes down to the wire -- will we change willingly, or will the increasingly dangerous climate conditions force change upon us?

It also comes down to being willing to sacrifice for the common good, and to reducing our ecological footprints so we can live more sustainably. This week we are reflecting on paragraphs 137 to 142, which can be accessed by clicking here and scrolling down.

Before I get into the Pope's discussion of an integral ecology, I'd like to share a little piece I came across from Australia's Rolling Stone Magazine (Issue 771, February 2016). David Suzuki, our Canadian environmental scientist and global climate change crusader, had this to say:

We are enmeshed...

"I'm an atheist, but the Pope's environmental Encyclical [June 2015's 'Laudato Si'] was such a mind-boggling event: I'd kiss his hands, his feet and any other place he'd want me to kiss him, just for publishing that amazing document! He's done something that we don't tend to do: we tend to go, 'Oh, this is an issue of hunger and poverty, that's Oxfam; this is an issue of social justice, that's Amnesty International; this is an issue of environment, that's the Suzuki Foundation' – we act as though these are separate issues. And the Pope doesn't separate them: he says, 'We've spent all our time focused on two relationships: our human relationship with God, and our relationship with each other. But there is a third relationship, and that's our relationship with the rest of Creation.' Thank you, Francis. It's an astounding thing to come out of the Catholic freakin' Church!"

- See more at: http://rollingstoneaus.com/culture/post/david-suzuki-encounter/3089#sthash.29L9Togm.dpuf

Suzuki is right -- the beauty of the Pope's letter to the world is that it underlines, over and over again, the importance of realizing that everything we do impacts life on this planet in some way, and that there are no "separate issues." We are enmeshed in creation, in our world's many issues, in each other's lives.

Paragraph 137 begins with the refrain that everything is closely interrelated (we hear it twice more in these 6 paragraphs!), followed with the reminder that we need to take into account "every aspect of the global crisis" using an integral ecology. In other words, we must look at what is happening to the environment through the lenses of science, culture, politics, technology, faith, health, resource use, equality and solidarity, climate change, economics, everything.

Facing up to the challenge of employing an integral ecology requires "reflection and debate about the conditions required for the life and survival of society" (paragraph 138), not to mention the rest of creation. "Nature cannot be regarded as something separate from ourselves or as a mere setting in which we live. We are part of nature, included in it and thus in constant interaction with it" (paragraph 139). And the crises we face are both social and environmental, demanding "an integrated approach to combating poverty, restoring dignity to the excluded, and at the same time protecting nature." If we can do those three things, our ecology becomes pretty wholistic or integral.

Paragraph 140 notes that researchers have an important role in determining the environmental impacts of human activity, and that they must have the academic freedom to help us to understand the balance of the ecosystems that make up our planet because otherwise, we can't begin to live sustainably. We humans are pretty good at seeing the things that directly impact us, but wear blinders when it comes to the importance of other creatures essential to the world's survival, not to mention our own. Case in point? The past and present use of DDT and other pesticides -- that we now know are found in our own bodies, though they were only supposed to suppress certain "pests."

Pope Francis is trying to make us realize that the economy's "predictable reactions and... standardization with the aim of simplifying procedures and reducing costs" can no longer be the driving force in our earth's development (paragraph 141). The quality life for all creatures and the human institutions that protect justice, peace and freedom for all of creation need to be given higher priority than the many financial and political forces that have overseen our planet and allowed it to fall into ruin.

One major problem, according to paragraph 142, is that lack of respect for the law has become more and more common at all levels. The pope and friends cite the continuing destruction of forests in countries that have clear forest protection legislation, and the importing of drugs to affluent societies from poor regions that suffer because of the drug trade. If we follow world news at all, we can probably name dozens of other examples of international, national, and local laws that are being ignored all the time, or situations where industry or politics find and exploit loopholes in various social and environmental regulations.

It makes me happy that more and more, activists are discovering and speaking up about the places where laws are ignored to the detriment of our planet -- and that average citizens are getting involved through social media campaigns. But what really needs to happen is that we all need to develop an integral way of thinking at all levels, all the time.

Today is the first Sunday of Lent in the Christian world, and perhaps our challenge for these days leading to Easter can be to see our lives with integral ecology in mind. Almost every choice we make as human beings, whether we realize it or not, has an impact on our planet. For example, my choices this morning have included what to eat for breakfast (what do my food choices cost my planet?) how to prepare it (how is my energy use impacting the environment?), what I will wear (how has it been produced, and who or what is affected by that?) and how I will get to church (what are my fossil fuel emissions?) Seeing how we are enmeshed in the bigger picture takes effort and practice, but it can help us to live more sustainably.

This Lent, we can ask ourselves: How am I enmeshed in God's creation? How can I live more sustainably? How do I fit into an integral ecology?

*******

A prayer for our earth

All-powerful God, you are present in the whole universe

and in the smallest of your creatures.

You embrace with your tenderness all that exists.

Pour out upon us the power of your love,

that we may protect life and beauty.

Fill us with peace, that we may live

as brothers and sisters, harming no one.

O God of the poor,

help us to rescue the abandoned and forgotten of this earth,

so precious in your eyes.

Bring healing to our lives,

that we may protect the world and not prey on it,

that we may sow beauty, not pollution and destruction.

Touch the hearts

of those who look only for gain

at the expense of the poor and the earth.

Teach us to discover the worth of each thing,

to be filled with awe and contemplation,

to recognize that we are profoundly united

with every creature

as we journey towards your infinite light.

We thank you for being with us each day.

Encourage us, we pray, in our struggle

for justice, love and peace.

+AMEN.

(A prayer for our earth and all quotations from Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home © Libreria Editrice Vaticana)

Up next: #28... Grassroots Cultural Ecology

I wasn't going to moodle today, but...

...this fellow has charmed me with his message of simplicity, sustainability, and connecting with ourselves and others. Now I'm wondering how it might translate to this crazy cold country in which I live. I guess not following fashion (because we'll never catch up to it!) might be a start...

If you want to know more about Jon Jandai's work, check out http://www.punpunthailand.org/.

#56 of 100... Buy electricity from a wind power provider

Ever heard of Bullfrog Power? About three years ago, I was being my Master Composter/Recycler Volunteer self at a trade show (educating the public about ways to reduce their contributions to the landfill) when a volunteer from another booth brought me a brochure about buying electricity from greener sources. A lot of Alberta's energy is derived from coal-based electricity (we have huge coal pits that provide fuel for the Genessee power plants west of Edmonton), and unfortunately, coal power contributes a lot of greenhouse gases to our planet.

The lovely volunteer girl offered me a new alternative energy option. Nope, I'm not talking about nuclear power, especially not since the March near melt down at Fukushima. More like this:

Her brochure explained that for a little more money each year, we could buy wind energy rather than the coal power offered by our energy provider. And being interested in reducing our emissions and trying to leave a smaller carbon footprint so future generations have a fighting chance, we hopped on board with many other Bullfrog customers. Alternative energy sources have to replace fossil fuels if we want to slow global climate instability and end resource wars. The way we see it, that little bit extra we pay each month is our investment in a cleaner, healthier and happier future, not just for us, but for our brothers and sisters all across the globe. Definitely worth the price!

Are you able to buy electricity from an alternate energy provider? It might take a bit of effort to find out... but if you learn that the option doesn't exist where you are, if you ask your energy provider what they're doing to develop non-fossil fuel energy sources, perhaps they'll consider coming up with different options once they know consumers like you prefer them. My husband's cousin in Canada's far north tells us that even the remote community of Cambridge Bay is trying to come up with more sustainable energy options. If they can do it way up in the Land of the Midnight Sun, there's no excuse for the rest of the planet.

Anyway... today's Simple Suggestion is an encouragement to look at where your electricity comes from and see how sustainable it could be with a little encouragement from you. There's no such thing as a perfectly clean energy source -- even solar panels and wind turbines require a fair bit of fossil fuel energy input before they're up and running -- but over the long term, they're more environmentally friendly than the others.

And just in case you're interested, here's how our clean energy provider explains itself:

P.S. Looking for more Simple Suggestions? Try here.

Living simply, sustainably, and in solidarity with the poor

The above phrase jumped out at me a while back from something I was reading, and today it's back in my mind, as my husband sent me an article from the Globe and Mail entitled "Wikileaks reveals imminent Saudi Oil Peak."

Good old Wikileaks! (That with my tongue firmly in my cheek. Honestly, who ever heard of it before last April?) Actually, I am sickened by the way Wikileaks put information out there without considering the safety of anyone connected to the countries involved in its reports. Even rogue media outlets need to care about peoples' lives! At the same time, I can't help feeling that we need some alternative media that will put out the stories that our mainstream media avoid discussing in depth. A lot of big news outlets have to appease big advertizers that don't have humanity's best interests at heart, so they gloss over the serious issues that our world is facing when they should be challenging the world to deeper thinking.

Peak oil is one of those issues. If, as Wikileaks suggests, we are already well past the point where we are starting to run out of oil, humanity is soon going to have to make a huge shift in its thinking, a shift that we probably should have made fifty years ago (but everyone was so in love with our rising standard of living after World War II that to suggest something like voluntary simplicity was akin to being a communist).

So here we are, having reached peak oil, and instead of jumping deeper into consumerism and taking last minute trips to the Caribbean before we can't afford it, we need to hit reverse and do as the title of this moodling suggests (I've since found this phrase in several social justice documents). It's well past time to live justly. North Americans make up a large portion of the wealthy 12 percent of the world population who are using up 80% of the world's resources. If everyone lived like we do, the planet would never recover.

So what if we 12% stopped stuffing our lives with that 80% and started living simply, sustainably, and in solidarity with the other 88% who are living with 20% of the earth's resources? What if we reduced our consumption to our 12% or maybe even a bit less? What would that look like? And could we be happy with less than 12%?

Of course we could, but like shifting our thinking around the Peak Oil issue, shifting our thinking around choosing to live more simply is a huge challenge for many of us. First of all, we would have to get our brains around the idea that markets and economies cannot grow endlessly because things that grow endlessly are often carcinogenic. We would need to learn the meaning of the word "sufficient" and practice living it, aware that too much of anything good is still too much. We would have to eradicate the "Joneses" from our thinking entirely, and be satisfied with what we have, rather than continue clearing out our closets, tossing our technologies and renovating our homes in order to "keep up." Maybe we would turn off the TV or the internet and find better uses for our time, get more exercise, grow more of our own food, cook more from scratch, have more conversations, make more music, meet more neighbours and have more face time with family and friends.

I've gotten carried away... but I'm just thinking about a book I once found at the library, the name of which escapes me. It was a book of pictures of people from all over the world, and what they owned. There was a picture of a large family from a developing country in Africa, sitting in front of a mud hut on a blanket with dishes and pots, bags of rice and beans, a small pile of clothing, and huge smiles all around. There was also a picture of a small family from North America with a large home and tons of belongings spilled along their driveway, but they didn't look as happy as the family from Africa. And then there was a picture of a family from Saudi Arabia that had to be taken from such a great distance to fit in their mansion and limousines and stuff that you couldn't see their faces at all. I wish I could remember the name of that book. It was a good one. I'll find it again.

Personally, I think living simply, sustainably and in solidarity with our brothers and sisters all over the world is the only way to go, and it's probably more fun, if you really think about it. If we've reached peak oil, perhaps we'll all rediscover the joys of living simply sooner than later. At least, I hope it can work out that way.

(P.S. That book is called Material World: A Global Family Portrait by Peter Mendel (1994, Sierra Club Books, ISBN 9780871564375)