Ash Wednesday Ponderings

At times I find myself saying a few words at Ash Wednesday Services - at other times, I don't. This is one of those times. (The Order of Service for an Ash Wednesday Service follows as a separate posting.)

When I drive by billboards I can't help but turn and read them, especially those that churches put up. Some of them bring me a chuckle (like "Patience is a virtue with a lot of wait" or "Treat yourself to one of our Sundays"), some of them find me saying "Amen!" to the sentiment, and others have me groaning theologically. Part of my problem is that ever sense I've learned to read, I read everything I see. I can't help it. 

The one that caught me this week however was a sign that said: "Humility is how we denounce temptation." While I might phrase this differently, it struck me as being very appropriate for Ash Wednesday and for the 1st Sunday of Lent in which we read about Jesus' Temptations in the Wilderness (if following the Revised Common Lectionary).

Ash Wednesday as always struck me as one of humbleness. We are remembering our origins, and the blessings that come from that. After all, God formed us from the dust of the earth, and called us blessed. Even if we haven't always lived that way.

The postings of late have been rather academic is some ways. And yet they also hit home for me. How about for you? I find them challenging. I know that I am no where near living a fully just lifestyle. I'd love to give up a car, for instance, but the commute between boat and bread job is just too far right now to do so. I do, however, find these readings to challenge me to think in more creative ways. Ways that benefit not only myself, and those immediately around me, but those across the globe, as well as the globe. Together we can make a difference in how the Kingdom of God is realized here and now.

Traditionally Lent has been a time of giving something up. I'd rather be pro- something rather than anti- something. So rather than giving up sugar, for example, I'd rather be for eating more healthfully. One of my colleagues announced on facebook that he was thinking about giving up his car for Lent. Immediately he got feedback from someone who had given up her car a number of years ago. I think our greatest asset is one another. I'm going to strive to eat lower on the food chain this Lent, while also being intentional about community. How about you?

Ash Wednesday Service

The following is an Ash Wednesday Service that I often use. This comes right out of the United Methodist Book of Worship and the United Methodist Hymnal. 

May you have a good and humble Ash Wednesday where ever you are.

Joel

GREETING:
The grace of the Lord Jesus Christ be with you.
And also with you.
Bless the Lord who forgives all our sins.
God’s mercy endures forever.

OPENING PRAYER   (from the United Methodist Hymnal #353)

O God,

maker of every thing and judge of all that you have made,

from the dust of the earth you have formed us 

and from the dust of death you would raise us up.

By the redemptive power of the cross, 

create in us clean hearts

and put within us a new spirit,

that we may repent of our sins

and lead lives worthy of your calling;

through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

SCRIPTURE:
Joel 2:1-2, 12-17
Psalm 51 #785
Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21

INVITATION TO THE OBSERVANCE OF LENTEN DISCIPLINE
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ:

the early Christians observed with great devotion 

the day of our Lord's passion and resurrection, 

and it became the custom of the Church that before the Easter celebration 

there should be a forty-day season of spiritual preparation.

During this season converts to the faith were prepared for Holy Baptism.

It was also a time when persons who had committed serious sins 

and had separated themselves from the community of faith 

were reconciled by penitence and forgiveness, 

and restored to participation in the life of the Church.

In this way the whole congregation was reminded 

of the mercy and forgiveness proclaimed in the gospel of Jesus Christ 

and the need we all have to renew our faith.

I invite you, therefore, in the name of the Church, 

to observe a holy Lent: 

by self-examination and repentance; 

by prayer, fasting, and self-denial; 

and by reading and meditation on God's Holy  Word.

To make a right beginning of repentance, 

and as a mark of our mortal nature, 

let us now kneel (or bow) before our Creator and Redeemer.

(a brief silence is kept)

THANKSGIVING OVER THE ASHES
Almighty God, you have created us out of the dust of the earth. 

Grant that these ashes may be to us a sign of our mortality and penitence,

so that we may remember that only by your gracious gift

are we given everlasting life;

through Jesus Christ our Savior. Amen.

IMPOSITIONS OF THE ASHES
(as people come forward, a leader dips a thumb in the ashes and makes 

a cross on the forehead of each person saying:
Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.

THE LORD’S PRAYER

DISMISSAL WITH A BLESSING

“1978” or “Intergenerational Equity”

I was amazed to read that within in my own lifetime, and yet before my younger sisters were born, we as a human species crossed the threshold of the Earth’s sustainable yield by our consumption. The year was 1978. Prior to this date, when humans over consumed, we took away from the other species trying to survive upon the planet. After 1978, we started consuming other humans’ share, at the expense of future human generations. This figure is in part linked to the growth of the human population. However, the World Bank is actually predicting a slowing down of the human doubling rate, the first time this has happened since we humans reached a billion in numbers. Women in less industrialized nations are giving birth to four rather than six children (a drop from thirty years previously). While unsure as to the reasons behind this trend, demographers are now predicting, if all factors remain the same, a peak in the human population between 10 and 11 billion people by 2100.*

The Earth produces a tremendous amount of life each year. When unstressed, and unconsumed this life adds to the bioproductivity that can be used currently, and into future generation. When more is consumed than is produced, we wear down the Earth’s systems, leaving less for future generations. If these growth predictions are true, then in 2050 the earth will contain 9 billion people, and the $980 a year share of the world’s GNP will have shrunk to $650 and humanity will be overshooting the world’s carrying capacity by 88 percent.**

Of course, we humans could decide to address these issues and make the significant changes necessary …

The key to Intergenerational equity is passing down to the next generation (especially the yet unborn generation) the Earth with no degradation, or even more bioproductivity, reversing in the degradation process. To do so, we have to scale back our annual take on an already overworked system.

As Jim Merkel sums up: “In the 150 or so years since the Industrial Revolution, we’ve doubled the population 4 times and doubled the size of the global economy 20 times … Currently, humanity takes 20 percent more than is produced, thus wearing down the Earth’s systems. Might it be wise to scale back our annual take to help the overworked systems rebound? We can either err on the side of caution or gamble with our children’s future.”***

__________
* Jim Merkel Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on the Finite Earth. (New Society Publishers, 2003.) 64.
** Ibid. 63.
***Ibid. 64. 65.

“Interspecies Equity” or “4.7 Acres”

All Creatures of our God and King,
Lift up your voice and with us sing,
O praise ye! Alleluia!
O brother sun with golden beam,
O sister moon with silver gleam!
O praise ye! Allelulia! Alleluia! Allelulia!

(Francis of Assisi, ca. 1225; trans William H. Draper, 1925, 

adapt. 1987)

Francis of Assisi was known for his love of all creation. So was Albert Schweitzer, who apparently had his wooden organ covered with cooper while serving as a doctor in Africa so that he didn’t have to poison, kill or injure the wood bores who were in the process of attacking it. I wonder, how anthropocentric a world view did either Francis or Schweitzer have?

Jim Merkel provides some thought-provoking details, especially if we long to follow in the just as radical today as it was then footsteps of Francis or Schwitzer.

Ecological Overshoot of the Human Economy, states that there are 28.2 billion acres of bioproductive land on Earth – the total surface area minus the deep oceans, deserts, icecaps and built-up land. When divided between six billion people, each person gets a 4.7-acre share – we’ll call this area each person’s “personal planetoid.” But this assumes that humanity uses the entire planet’s annual production. The question then becomes “How much of my 4.7-acre share do I want to use for myself and how much do I want to leave for other life forms?” You might think, “I want to share it all.” A generous thought. But the reality is, you need to consume to survive. And what you use is not available for the deer, rabbits, or coyotes. For example, assume I am fenced into a one-acre garden with one deer and we eat the plants almost as fast as they grow, but don’t deplete them. After 60 years, the land is still just as productive as it was when w entered. Generous me then invites a friend inside the fence. Now the plants can’t keep pace with our appetites, and the land becomes depleted. Renewable “resources,” or the planet’s “bioproductivity,” takes time to regenerate. They are only renewable if they’re consumed at a rate slower than their annual growth or yield.
With a mere 1.5 million of the estimated 7 to 25 million species identified worldwide, caution is in order. And, with the current extinction rate estimated at 100 to 1,000 time faster than the natural rate, humanity’s current idea of sharing nature is deeply challenging.*

As I will mention in a later blog, this is in part due to humanities consuming beyond the tipping point. We are no longer just consuming nature, we are consuming ourselves (see 1978 or Intergenerational Equity to come).

Remember too that the 4.7-acres is to deal with our complete footprint (carbon, waste, housing, etc). 

If a visual would help, an acre (4,840 square yards) is slightly smaller than a USA football field (5,330 square yards).

Conservation biology looks at the question of interspecies equity through the needs of entire ecosystems. “Reed F. Noss, a specialist in the field, has outlined four objectives that will maintain native biodiversity in perpetuity:

• Represent, in a system of protected areas, all native ecosystem types and serial stages across their natural range of variation.
• Maintain viable populations of all native species in natural patterns of abundance and distribution.
• Maintain ecological and evolutionary processes, such as disturbance regimes, hydrological processes, nutrient cycles, and biotic interactions, including predation.
• Design and manage the system to be responsive to short-term and long-term environmental change and to maintain the evolutionary potential of lineages.**

Noss further figures that to create such an arena where biodiversity and viability of species is preserved would require between 25 to 75 percent of the total land area in most regions would need to be put into reserves with buffer zones surrounding them.

To put this into perspective:

To maintain a minimum population of 1,000 animals would require 242 million acres for grizzly bears, 200 million acres for wolverines, and 100 million acres for wolves. Even the six-million-acre Adirondack Park, which contains the combined areas of Yosemite, Yellowstone, Olympic, and Grand Canyon National Parks struggled to support a reintroduction of lynx. … If the area outlined … was extensively restored, a 200 million acre (312,000 square mile) core area could be formed in New England and Canada. With a drastic reduction of roads and traffic, and a citizenry ready to co-exist with wildlife, these animals might make their way back down from Canada. Sound impossible? Living in British Columbia for seven years among grizzlies, cougars, and wolverines, I leaned that co-existing is not rocket science, not costly, and not even difficult. But it would take a redesign of the human environment and a willingness to change habits.***

Merkel points out that the real issue is one of Anthropocentrisms, in which we hold that humans are the measure of things. A Biocentric or Deep Ecology viewpoint might be needed if we were to truly change course.

I might also add, from a theological viewpoint, that anthropocentrism can be a hindrance in understanding the Divine.

_________
* Jim Merkel. Radical Simplicity: small footprints on a finite Earth. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers, 2003. 55–6, 56–7 .
** Ibid. 57. Merkel quotes Reed F. Noss. “The Wildlands Project: Land Conservation Strategy”, Wild Earth Special Issue (1993): pp.10-21.
***Ibid. 57, 58.

Interhuman Equity

Imagine a potluck dinner in which all 6 billion plus people of our planet attend, Jim Merkel invites. You are in line first. How much food do you take? After the meal, you go to gather the supplies you need for the year, again, how much do you take?

Let’s consider two hypothetical scenarios. After you green grass and blue sky dinner, the ten people at your table get a basket of money equal to ten sustainable, equitable shares of the world Gross National Product (GNP). To determine how much is in the basket, we first divide the total world GNP - $29,340 billion – by six billion people for a $4,900 share. But because the total economic activity of humanity overshoots the globe’s carrying capacity by 20 percent we adjust the share to $3,900. At this level of GNP, we still have humanity consuming the entire global bioproductivity. Let’s say we scale back total human impact in terms of GNP by 75 percent to make room for the millions of other species. Each person would now have an annual equitable share of the world GNP equal to $980. You begin to try to imagine living on $980 a year, gulp… and you freeze. Impossible!

The basket has $9,800, or 10 times the $980 equal shares. This money is laid out in bundles of 100 one-dollar bills. Now each draws a number from a hat. You draw first, and can take what you want. Everyone watches in silence. How much to you take?*

Merkel switches scenarios slightly. Now you can approach an ATM machine behind a curtain, with no societal pressures, you could take as much as you want, you’re first after all, and no one will know but you how much you took. Again, how much to you take?*

Merkel again posits these hard questions of global living in a remarkable way. So far we have been touching on the GNP, economics, and later he speaks of how much land is equitable for us humans to use. Not in terms of living on, but in terms of use: CO2 absorption, food production so that we can eat, etc. At the same time, he is asking us hard questions; he also gives us hope from the past. The western understanding of the way of relating to one another and the world hasn’t and isn’t the only way. He also gives inspiration.

Charles Gray, from Eugene, Oregon, author of Toward a Nonviolent Economics, developed the concept of World Equity Wage (WEW) and capped his wage at $3.14 an hour, and worked no more than 20 hours a week. His voluntary “deprivileging” was motivated by a goal of sharing the available work and wealth with humanity and restoring the environment. When we meet in 1995, he had already been living for 17 years on what he calculated to be the World Equity Budget (WEB), and averaged $1,190 in total annual living expenses from 1978 to 1993. He is a delightful, open-minded person and his book is an inspiration.

After 14 years of living on $5,000 per year (placing me amongst the wealthiest 17 percent of humanity), I know it would take a quantum redesign of my life and significantly reduced expectations of services to approach equity. I know it is hard in the context of an unsustainable culture, but every bit of societal level change, be it bike lanes, mixed zoning, or local organic markets will make the whole process easier.**

______
* Jim Merkel Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on the Finite Earth. (New Society Publishers, 2003. 58-60.
**Ibid. 61-2.

Questions of Equity

“You will never understand violence and nonviolence until you understand the violence to the spirit that happens from watching your children die of malnutrition.” ~ a Salvadoran peasant*

This is a rather sobering way to begin a discussion on equity, but an important reminder about the global nature of this topic. As children we are brought up striving for fairness, for equity. Most children understand this topic quite well, and are often the first to point out how unjust a situation is. In growing up, somewhere along the line, we start tampering with this inner guide. Perhaps it is as Matthew Fox has commented that there is no place for the Child or the Mystic or the Elderly in the machine of the modern industrial complex. Perhaps this is so, perhaps this is so.

Yet the prophets of the Judeo-Christian tradition constantly remind us to care for the poor, the widowed, the orphaned, and the sojourner. Jesus reminds us to seek first the Kingdom of God, where justice and compassion kiss (as the psalmist says). Where we live in right relationship with one another. The Wesleys, and others, remind us that it is not enough to seek out personal salvation, but that our very salvation depends upon the salvation of society. The Kingdom come on Earth as in Heaven. That works and faith go hand in hand. Liberation theologians remind us, God has a preferential treatment for the poor and the oppressed.

But what does equality look like? Cannot we just raise everyone’s standard of living to our own? How much a say do the “voiceless” of nature: the waterways, the sky, the land have a say? And what about those with voice, but not our own: the birds of the air, the fish of the sea, and the creatures of the land? Do we really take seriously that the Earth is the Lord’s and the fullness thereof?

These next few blogs of the next week or so will be looking at these very questions. At the same time, I want to point out that while my family and I are striving to move into a more sustainable lifestyle, we ourselves are nowhere near where we want to be. I do not submit the following and upcoming blogs from a perspective of expertise, but rather as a starter for conversation around these important issues.

To start, here are some ethical questions Jim Merkel and James Huskins posit, followed by a litany from the United Methodist Hymnal.

Jim Merkel presents some ethical questions for us to ponder:

• Could Earth support all the world’s population at my standard of living?
• Do other species or people suffer because of my lifestyle?
• Do good things come from each dollar I spend?
• Do other species have inherent value?
• Should my race, gender, strength, taxonomy, education, or birthplace allow me to consume more than others?
• Are wars being fought over resources that I use?
• Do I support corporations or industries that damage the environment or exploit workers in sweatshops?
• Is my lifestyle in alignment with my own values?**

James Huskins writes about the questions he ponders when picking out tools, whether they be a hammer or a computer:

For most of that time my guiding principle has been whether these tools are “appropriate.” Appropriateness means more than whether a tool is well made, well suited to the job at hand, not likely to break down in use, and has a long life expectancy, although all these factors are port of the equation.
Also involved are questions such as: Does the manufacture and/or use of this tool seriously degrade the environment? Does owning this tool make me more or less dependent on corporations whose scruples are as readily for sale as their products? Does the use of this tool enhance my ability to think well and my capacity to provide for basic needs? Is the tool obscenely expensive to purchase and/or use? Will the kingdom of God be any closer to existing on earth as it is in heaven if I have this tool?***

And from the United Methodist Hymnal’s collection of Affirmations of Faith (this can be read responsively, one group/person in the lighter text, the other in the italicized/bold faced text):

We believe in God, creator of the world and of all people;
and in Jesus Christ, incarnate among us,
   who died and rose again;
and in the Holy Spirit,
   present with us to guide, strengthen, and comfort.
We believe;
God, help our unbelief.
We rejoice in every sign of God’s kingdom:
   in the upholding of human dignity and community;
   in every expression of love, justice, and reconciliation;
   in each act of self-giving on behalf of others;
   in the abundance of God’s gifts entrusted to us that all may have enough;
   in all responsible use of the earth’s resources.
Glory be to God on high;
and on earth, peace.
We confess our sin, individual and collective,
   by silence or action:
      through the violation of human dignity
         based on race, class, sex, nation, or faith;
      through the exploitation of people
         because of greed and indifference;
      through the misuse of power
         in personal, communal, national and international life;
      through the search for security
         by those military and economic forces that threaten human existence;
      through the abuse of technology
         which endangers the earth and all life upon it.
Lord, have mercy;
Christ, have mercy;
Lord, have mercy.
We commit ourselves individually and as a community
   to the way of Christ:
   to take up the cross;
   to seek abundant life for all humanity;
   to struggle for peace with justice and freedom;
   to risk ourselves in faith, hope, and love,
      praying that God’s kingdom may come.
Thy kingdom come on earth as it is in heaven. Amen.****

______________

*World Bank. 2000 World Development Indicators CD-ROM. Washington DC: World Bank, 2000.
** Jim Merkel. Radical Simplicity: small footprints on a finite Earth. Gabriola Island, BC: New Society Publishers, 2003. 53–4 .
*** James Huskins. “Mix and Match.” The Plain Reader: Essays on Making a Simple Life. Scott Savage, Ed. New York: Ballantine Publishing Group, 1998. 120–123. 120–1.
****The United Methodist Hymnal. Nashville: United Methodist Publishing House, 1989. 886.

Perspective & Prophets

Prophets often give insights on the way things are in “society” due to their position of life, and experiences from a place, or time spent, on the margins. The view from the margins provides a different perspective upon what is going on in “center stage.” Good art does this. But I also suspect that most of us have had experiences of a changed perspective.

I, myself, have experienced this after a long vacation. Upon returning, after truly relaxing, I wondered why I was so anxious about a certain project, or internal politics. In essence, what had seemed of the utmost importance before my leaving, didn’t seem all that important in the grand scheme of things upon returning. Perhaps you have similar experiences.

My question arises, how does society as a whole (not to mention certain sub-groupings) listen to these perspectives and make the changes that are called for?

As I was re-reading Bernard Moitessier’s The Long Way,* I was reminded that prophets come in all shapes and sizes. But before quoting what Moitessier has to say, maybe it is worthwhile for those of you not familiar with him, to give some perspective.

Moitessier left Plymouth, England August 22, 1968 to sail around the world non-stop by the three great capes (Good Hope, Leeuwin and Horn). In his memoirs, Tamata and the Alliance, he writes that his was an attempt to regain the Alliance he felt with the gods, an alliance he had had ever sense growing up in Indochina. Nonetheless, he felt he had lost this alliance by his own actions while living in France. Along the voyage, he is transformed. After rounding Cape Horn he feels he must decide weather to continue on into the Pacific (re-passing the Cape of Good Hope and Leeuwin) or return to England, and finish the Golden Globe race in which he was participating. By the way, unknown to him at the time, the press was predicting that he would win on both the fastest time, and the first to return.

Moitessier writes:

I have set course for the Pacific again…last night was too hard to take, I really felt sick at the thought of getting back to Europe, back to the snakepit. … does it make sense to head for a place knowing you will have to leave your peace behind? …
I am really fed up with false gods, always lying in wait, spider-like, eating our your liver, sucking our marrow. I charge the modern world-that’s the Monster. It is destroying our earth, and trampling the soul of men.
‘Yet it is thanks to the modern world that you have a good boat with winches, Tergal sails, and a solid metal hull that doesn’t give you any worries.’
‘That’s true, but it is because of the modern world, because of its so-called “civilization” and its so-called “progress” that I take off with my beautiful boat.’
‘Well, you’re free to split, no one is stopping you; everyone is free here, so long as it doesn’t interfere with others.’
‘Free for the moment…but before long no one will be free if things go on. They have already become inhuman. So there are those who go to sea or hit the road to seek the lost truth. And those who can’t, or won’t anymore, who have lost even hope. “Western civilization” is almost completely technocratic now, it isn’t a civilization any more.’
‘If we listened to people like you, more or less vagabonds and barefoot tramps, we would not have got beyond the bicycle.’
‘That’s just it; we would ride bikes in the cities, there wouldn’t be those thousands of cars with hard, closed people all alone in them, we would see youngsters arm in arm, hear laughter and singing, see nice things in people’s faces; joy and love would be reborn everywhere, birds would return to the few trees left in our streets and we would replant the trees the Monster killed. Then we would feel real shadows and real colours and real sounds; our cities would get their souls back, and people too.’

And I know all that is no dream, everything beautiful and good that men have done they built with their dreams…but back there, the Monster has taken over for men, it dreams in our place. It would have us believe that man is the centre of the universe, that all rights are his on the pretense that he invented the steam engine and lots of other machines, and that he will someday reach the stars if he just hurries a little before the next bomb.
Nothing to worry about there, our hurrying suits the Monster just fine…he helps us hurry…time is short…hardly any time left…
‘Run! Run!… don’t stop to think, whatever you do; I the Monster am doing the thinking…run toward the destiny I have planned for you…run without stopping to the end of the road where I have put the Bomb or the complete degradation of humanity…we’re almost there, run with your eyes closed, it’s easier, shout all together Justice-Patriotism-Progress-Intelligence-Dignity-Civilization…What, you aren’t running…you’re sailing around on your boat, just to think!…and you dare complain into your tape recorder…saying what you have in your heart…just wait, you poor fool, I’m going to shoot you down in flames…guys who get angry and speak out are very dangerous to me, I have to shut them up…if too many of them started getting angry, I wouldn’t be able to drive the human cattle as I please, their eyes and ears blocked by Pride, Stupidity and Cowardice…and I’m in a hurry to get them, bleating and satisfied, where I want them to go…

The violent things rumbling within me vanished in the night. I look to the sea, and it answers that I escaped a great danger. I do not want to believe in miracles too much…yet there are miracles in life.*

And so Moitessier continues on his way toward the Capes of Good Hope, and Leeuwin before re-entering the Pacific and anchoring off the quay at Tahiti. As he re-rounds Good Hope (for the second time), he shoots a message inside a tin film can with his sling-shot: “I am continuing non-stop towards the Pacific Islands because I am happy at sea, and perhaps also to save my soul.” He later regrets the “perhaps,” for to save his soul is the true reason he continues onward.

And we, our western civilization, continue to run at the command of the Monster.

* Bernard Moitessier. The Long Way. (William Rodarmor, trans. (1971, 1986 Editions Arthaud, translation copyright, 1973) Sheridan House, 1995 edition, 163-165.