Don't just sit there...
I'm sitting in my office, typing, that's it. While I sit here comfortably, I hope the next few words will serve as a nudge for you to get up and take action. Today is blog action day, a day where bloggers around the globe unite, and all speak (through their keyboards) on one issue. This year the topic for blog action day is the environment. So here I sit wearing my 2007 earth day t-shirt getting ready to take action by writing a blog about the environment.
My t-shirt is white with a giant blue question mark on the front, the period of the question mark is a picture of the earth. People often ask me what the shirt means...thing is, I don't really know so I make up various things depending on the mood I'm in and how much I want to offend someone. Every time I wear this shirt I wonder what response people will have, what will they think of me (or how might I be labeled) and how much longer. How much longer? How much longer will we continue to talk and blog about the environment before we each start doing something. That's what the question mark asks me, in other words, what is the environmental impact of my life and what am I doing about it? I'm sure the impact is large, but what I am doing about it is small.
I've noticed that many of my friends (and me) are quick to point fingers. We look at large organizations, and any/everything else that might make media coverage, and shake our heads at how these people are destroying our planet...they really need to do something about it we say. Then I see a reflection of my t-shirt in the mirror.
As much as we talk about saving the environment, many if not most of the people I know do little about it. I'd buy a hybrid car but...I'd recycle but...I'd only purchase fair trade but...I'd research before buying clothes but...get all these butts together and they begin to stink.
I know it's expensive, time consuming and inconvenient to be environmentally friendly, hey, it probably is for all those people we point fingers at too. I'm not asking you to buy a new car, but let's do something, anything, even if we think its small and really isn't making a difference. And when we do, and when the big players do, lets applaud the efforts of each other, rather than quickly conclude that more could be done.
Now that I'm down here at the bottom of this post, I really must add one more thing. Christians, people who claim to follow God in the way of Jesus, ought to be leading the way in these efforts. For too long we have embraced the idea that we will all die and go to a better place (heaven) so this current place (earth) doesn't really matter. You may not express it so bluntly with words, but you don't need to. If Christians are going to really be considered worthwhile in our world today, I suggest we need to continue helping each other spiritually, but we must also care about the physical and the global issues.
Okay, no more blogging time to take action before this day is over.
embracing life
Another perspective on life, worldviews, and God - and how they all fit together in everyday experience. Simple stuff.
3 Comments
9:11 AM
YES. I love this entry.
When I was in the 5th or 6th grade, my family went to Chicago to visit my aunt & uncle. One day I threw an aluminum can into the garbage and was immediately scolded by my aunt, who made me fish it out and place it in the recycling bin. I distinctly remember saying, out loud, to her: "Jesus is coming back soon to destroy the earth with fire anyway, so recycling doesn't really matter."
Sometimes it's expressed that bluntly. More often it's an underlying, almost subconscious thought pattern. But the sad fact is that belief does still cause many people to walk right past a perfectly accessible recycling bin and toss perfectly reusable materials into a bag that's bound for the compost pile.
This is one of those issues where people really need to experience a change in thinking before an effective change in the environment can happen. For instance, I would gladly recycle because my aunt told me to, but when I got back home from Chicago, I went right back to throwing recyclables away in the garbage. To me at that time, there was no significance to the act of recycling - it was just a bother, inconvenient, another step you had to take. There has to be a true understanding of the significance of taking care of the environment before the action itself takes on any meaning and becomes worth one's time.
On the other hand, though... We need to be grateful for any steps, even small steps, toward change. So often it seems (as you discussed, Steve) that environmentalists are not even pleased with small steps toward change. We look down the road to the end result we want - zero emissions, 100% recyclable materials, fully renewable energy sources - and rarely seem to pause to be thankful for the small steps that individuals and companies take toward those goals.
A more powerful catalyst for change than doom & gloom and the blame game is to encourage good growth by praising it, being thankful for it, supporting it when it happens. It seems every time I hear about something good Starbucks has done in it's operating procedure (solar energy, selling the Ethos water, etc.), there is always someone who is quick to condemn the entire company because it still hasn't done this or that. Hey, you don't have to buy from Starbucks if that means you're supporting something you're against. But is it so hard to acknowledge that the company is at least making strides toward change?
The truth is, the percentage of people that live completely green lives, producing or consuming absolutely nothing that hurts our environment, and completely replacing what they do consume, well, that percentage is pretty dang small, if not nonexistent. I think there might be some Jesus-instituted principle that could apply here... something about the one who's innocent casting the first stone?
I know that environmental issues are urgent, and I'm not suggesting we stop encouraging greater & greater change in our world. But just like I needed to experience a real change in my thinking before recycling became meaningful, we also need to experience a real change in our attitude toward progress before these small steps become meaningful. Any progress is good & should be celebrated, not condemned for being insufficient or a diversion from some other environmental problem that still needs to be corrected.
Oh, and one last thing! I found recycling in downtown San Diego to be very difficult because my building doesn't (and won't) pay for a recycling program. Then Sylvia reminded me that everyday we see homeless people searching through garbage cans for recyclable materials; it's not an inconvenience to them to carry bottles & cans to the recycling center because it helps keep them fed. So now I take mine down to the street and give them away or leave them beside a garbage can. It is usually only moments before they're picked up. Is that the best possible scenario? No! My building should pay for a recycling program, I shouldn't be so lazy, and the homeless person shouldn't have to dig through garbage cans to survive. But it's a small step: better than me simply not recycling because it's inconvenient. And small steps are OK.
12:02 PM
I think it would be helpful if we took most of Matthews comment and applied it not only to the environment but also to our faith, and what it means to follow God in the way of Jesus. We should encourage what we are thinking, believing and doing as Christians, small steps are OK.
7:41 AM
all these butts together do stink!
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