Despite the bad news that many politicians, and powerful corporate personnel refuse to acknowledge the existence of climate change, there is also positive news. The David Suzuki Foundation, for example, has published a summary of how some Canadian cities are responding to the need to reduce our use of energy. These are steps along the journey, as the faith statement of my Christian denomination tells me, towards “living with respect in creation”.

Easter sunrise, 2014

Read the positive news at: http://www.davidsuzuki.org/blogs/science-matters/2014/07/canadas-cities-lead-on-climate-action/

 The posting from the Suzuki Foundation also provides links to a number of original sources that are the source documentation for their conclusions.

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My mind suffers from a “history deficit”.

The historical context of many events that are happening in Canadian society  is unknown to me, and I am grateful to those who offer lessons that expand my reality. One of the wonderful lessons is in the following post abut the Supreme Court’s recent decision on the Tsilhqot’in decision.

Ian Gill has published a blogpost that provided me with new insights on the context. For example, he writes:

“The Tsilhqot’in people had a history of bucking convention that stretched back to one of the great moments of resistance in B.C. history, the so-called Chilcotin War of 1864. Then, an attempt to build a road from Bute Inlet up to the Cariboo goldfields was brought to an abrupt and bloody end when several members of the road crew were killed; in retribution, six Tsilhqot’in men were arrested, tried and eventually hanged, even though they were later proven not to have taken part in the original war party.”

The full post, which helped me to reduce my “history deficit”, is available at: http://thetyee.ca/Opinion/2014/07/26/Tsilhqotin-With-Gloves/?utm_source=daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=260714

 

The equity of people is a basic tenet of all major, world-wide faith groups.

Take Responsibility

In the United Church of Canada, a Christian denomination, all of God’s children are welcome at the communion table. All are served the same bread and wine; the symbolism of unity in God’s presence matters. This is not so in the secular, political world of some governments today.

PressProgress summarizes the findings of an important OECD study on incomes in Canada, Australia and the United States of America. They report that:

“Increasing levels of economic inequality are the “new normal” and we can expect them to get worse, not better.

That’s the key takeaway from a recent study on long-run levels of income growth in Canada, Australia and the United States published by the OECD.

The study highlights the explosive rise of incomes in the top 1% over the last 30 years, and their growing share as compared to the bottom 90% and 99%. Authored by eminent Canadian economist and Broadbent Fellow Lars Osberg, it argues “there is no natural upper bound to the real incomes of the top 1% and thus no natural upper bound to their income gap with median households.”

Similar to the findings of French economist Thomas Piketty and the OECD, Osberg suggests that the balanced growth of the post-World War II era, which produced a more stable and fairer income distribution, bucked a broader trend in which inequality accumulates and deepens over generations.”

 The full report from PressProgress is available at: http://www.pressprogress.ca/en/post/rising-income-inequality-new-normal-study

For people of faith, reports such as these are worthy of deep reflection. What is it that our faith calls us to DO in these circumstances?

STOP!

by Gary Paterson Last week I was at a Benedictine retreat centre on Vancouver Island, for a week of prayer. Among several concerns, I held in my heart the people of Palestine and Israel, praying for an end to violence, for the willingness of all parties to come to the table to talk peace and justice. The centre (strangely enough, called “Bethlehem”) has no WiFi, which makes sense when one is trying to be in silence and to listen carefully to the whispering of the Spirit. But it is also a challenge when you worry that the bombs and rockets continue to explode over Gaza and Israel. I kept wondering what was happening. Now I am back in the “real” world. The violence increases, day by day, and hundreds of people have died. Real people, not statistics. People who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time… though is there any “right place” in Gaza? Or ever enough bomb shelters in Israel? Ordinary men, women, and children… children!… dead, because of a war that seems to never end. And I want to cry out, “STOP! Stop this killing; stop the invasion; stop the rockets.” I want to cry out to Israel, “Why are you doing this? Yes, you have every right to demand security; to live without fear of teenagers being kidnapped and killed, of rockets falling on your cities. But do you really think this invasion, so overwhelming and destructive, so disproportionate, will bring peace and security? Do you not understand that non-combatants, civilians, real people, simply trying to live ordinary, everyday lives are being killed? And that this war is creating reservoirs of rage that will fuel nightmares of revenge?” I want to cry out to the leaders of Hamas, “Why are you doing this? Do you really think that sending endless rockets into Israel and killing non-combatants, civilians, real people, simply trying to live ordinary lives, will bring peace to the people of Gaza?” I want to cry out to the leaders of Israel, “Stop the occupation! Stop the blockade of Gaza! Dismantle the settlements. The West Bank is not your land, there for the taking. Yes, you need a country; but so do the Palestinians. And unless you discover how two peoples can live side by side then you will continue to bring destruction down on everyone. Why will you not recognize the right of Palestine to exist within internationally recognized borders?” And I want to cry out to the leaders of Hamas, “Change your constitution and your rhetoric – endlessly calling out for the destruction of Israel is an act of violence, and will only create a fierce reaction, rooted in fear and anger. Why will you not recognize the right of Israel to exist within internationally recognized borders?” I want to cry out to the international community, “All states and leaders should be equally subject to the requirements of international law, without exception, including Israel and Palestine. Why can you not be even-handed and consistent for the sake of justice?” I want to cry out to my own government, “Stop being so one-sided in your assessment of the ongoing conflict between Israel and Palestine.  It’s far too simplistic to publicly blame only one side for all that has gone wrong; instead, recognize the complexity of what is happening. Seek justice; work for peace.” And I want to cry out to all the people who watch the news and either do nothing or point fingers at those whose opinions they disagree with. Enough. The world needs you to take a stand for peace and justice, to recognize that fellow human beings – both Israeli and Palestinian – are suffering. We must all do what we can – however simple – to end this cycle of violence. Why do I cry out? Because I dream of Israelis and Palestinians sitting down to engage in serious negotiations, not engaging in blame games, not trying to win a public relations and propaganda war, but seriously taking concrete steps towards a peaceful and just end of the conflicts that have ripped this land apart for so many years, so that ordinary people, on all sides of every border, will be free to work and laugh and cry, to build homes and families, and to know the great gift of peace. What effect can my words have? Probably nothing – but silence is not an option when the bombs and rockets are falling, when innocent people are being killed. And so I cry out; and I continue to pray. [Photos: #1): A doll lies on the rubble of a destroyed building on July 11, 2014, following an Israeli airstrike in Gaza City. Photo by Marco Bottelli. Copyright Demotix. #2):”Iron Dome in Operation Protective Edge” by Israel Defense Forces, (CC BY 2.0).] Gary Paterson | July 23, 2014 at 3:18 pm | Categories: Uncategorized | URL:http://wp.me/s2RwbK-stop This article was originally published at: http://www.garypaterson.ca/2014/07/23/stop/

GROWING AT THE ENDS AND EDGES

By Jim Taylor

Having become a gardener late in life, I have to admit that I get a certain sadistic satisfaction from the sucking sound that roots make as weeds reluctantly give up clutching the earth.
Of course, I’m kidding myself that the entire root mass has come up.
Years ago, an exhibit at the Ontario Science Centre demonstrated that a large part of any plant’s roots are invisible. They’re little tendrils of slime that prepare a path for the rest of the root to follow.
That’s how a boreal spruce can wedge itself into an infinitesimal crack. Slime will infiltrate even the finest of fissures. And where the slime has gone, woody root cells will follow. Until eventually the root splits a four-billion-year-old rock.
Sometimes I visualize trees as surgical stitches that bind earth and air together.
The two ends of trees — roots and branches — share many similarities. Both reach out from a central core. Both divide into smaller and smaller filaments. Both grow only at their farthest ends….

BRANCHES AND TRIBUTARIES
The pattern replicates in many other forms of life. It’s no coincidence that when we draw our ancestral lineages, we call them a family tree. The tributaries of a river make a root pattern as they flow together; when they reach a delta, they branch profusely. Our human circulatory system pumps blood out into smaller and smaller capillaries, then reverses the process to gather it back for cleansing and renewal.
Even our brains may work the same way. An impulse fires millions of axons and dendrites; the brain filters that input to the neurons most capable of handling it, and feeds back a conscious thought.
We ourselves, when born, have only one connection — an umbilical cord to the person whose bodily organs sustained us for nine months. Then that connection is severed, and we start building invisible networks of relationships. Consciousness networks, perhaps. Filaments of shared experience. Which extend farther and grow more complex as we mature.

A UNIVERSAL PATTERN
The pattern seems so universal, I’m tempted to extrapolate from it. For example, to hypothesize that growth only happens at the ends and edges.
In our personal lives, that means we need to keep pushing into uncharted territory to keep growing. We need to send out feelers into untested theories, unfamiliar relationships, unexplored situations. To see if something might take root there.
Also in our corporate lives. Growth does not come from our boardrooms and our head offices. The main trunk of any tree is mostly deadwood. Its sole purpose is to support the growing edges.
The early Christian church, a theology professor once pointed, grew at the edges. The new ideas — whether gentiles must observe Jewish law, whether women could be leaders, whether slaves could be free — got fed back from the new Christian communities to the central core.
Not all new ideas succeeded, of course. Some roots ran into dead ends. But others split the ancient rocks of tradition and created new ways of living.
The message seems clear — personally and collectively, we need to keep branching out beyond our comfort zones.
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Copyright © 2014 by Jim Taylor. Non-profit use in congregations and study groups, and links from other blogs, welcomed; all other rights reserved.
To comment on this column, write jimt@quixotic.ca

What is it that makes us “human”?

A reconstructed Neanderthal at the State Museum of Prehistory in Halle, Germany

 

Science is blurring the lines between humans and other species. Maybe we’re not the pinnacle of Creation after all.

Toronto author Alanna Mitchell explores the question of what makes us “human” in the following article, published in The United Church Observer. This is a magazine of “Faith, Justice and Ethical Living”.

http://www.ucobserver.org/features/2014/07/human_myth/#idc-container

 

 

Here’s Why Al Gore Is Optimistic About the Fight Against Climate Change.

(Photo: Carlos Barria/Reuters)

 

 

 

A new study predicts that more than half the world’s energy will come from carbon-free sources by 2030. “The 2030 Market Outlook is Bloomberg New Energy Finance’s long-term view of how the world’s power markets will evolve to 2030. These are the findings from the global overview report, covering the major economic and technological findings.”

 

The full report from Bloomberg is available at: http://bnef.folioshack.com/document/v71ve0nkrs8e0/who42hnkrs8fo

Theology in the Vineyard

In his brilliant Technics and Civilization (1934) Lewis Mumford analyzed the massive commodification of sport—and this was in the 30’s! Here are a few of his bons mots:

The machine had come into our civilization, not to save man from servitude, but to make possible mass servitude to the immoral standards of consumption that had grown up among the military atrocities.

 

Thus sport which began as a spontaneous reaction against the machine, has become one of the mass-duties of the machine age. It is a part of the universal regimentation of life, for the sake of private profits or nationalistic exploit.

 

Sport has turned out to be one of the least effective reactions against the machine, the other less effective in its reaction to the machine, more ambitious and ultimately disastrous, war.

This use of sport of course has been with us since Rome delivered bread and circuses…

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The Toronto Environmental Alliance – TEA – advocates that City Councillors ought to invest in our common environment. To delay is unjustifiable, they argue, just like failing to repair a leaky roof.

Morningside Park – Toronto

In 2014 the people of Toronto have an opportunity to elect people to City Council. TEA has outlined some of the major environmental issues, and offers some possible questions for candidates. This is all available at:

http://torontoenvironment.org/sites/tea/files/TEA_GreenActionAgenda_0.pdf

If you are not in Toronto, there is a possibility that similar issues apply to where you live.

Healing the wounded earth requires many steps – By Carolyn Pogue July 3, 2014

It looked a little like a refugee camp, with small tents pitched cheek by jowl along a narrow strip of land by Lake Gregoire. It was in a way, considering what brought hundreds of us together was a flight toward sanity in a world hell bent on using fossil fuels.

We were welcomed to Treaty Six land from all around North America: the Northwest Territories, Victoria, B.C., Texas and Vermont. We were all ages: senior to babies at the breast. We were First Nation Elders and chiefs, artists, religious people, lawyers, actors, environmentalists, university professors and grandparents — simply citizens. This was the fifth and final Healing Walk organized by The Athabasca River Keepers. My husband, former United Church Moderator Bill Phipps, noted: “This was not about stopping a pipeline, it was about the healing of the land. People came great distances because they care.” To me, the weekend felt like a living, breathing prayer.”

On the first day, we listened to actor Tantoo Cardinal, activist Crystal Lameman, Manitoba Grand Chief Derek Nepinak and other speakers whose passion and tenderness for Earth were inspiring. Annette Campre from Fort McKay First Nation told a silent crowd that she hasn’t used her tap water for 10 years. It is unsafe. “In my community we bathe babies in bottled water,” Campre said. I thought about donations I’ve made to Ryan’s Well, an organization that digs water wells in Africa. In Canada, we have an abundance of safe drinking water, but when there is oil in the ground, it may be poisoned, like in Fort McKay, Fort Chipewyan and other places downstream. Fracking poisons water, too. At the school on the Blood Reserve in southern Alberta, you can light the tap water on fire. Dr. John O’Connor, who was removed by the federal government from Fort Chipewyan after he spoke about detecting an abundance of cancers, also addressed us. Others spoke of skin rashes and persistent pneumonia, as well as fish with bulging eyes and skin diseases.

Healing Walk: Crystal Lameman explains protocol at the Healing Walk. Photo by Carolyn Pogue

But we also heard of the unanimous and hearteningSupreme Court decision that traditional Aboriginal lands can be protected under law. We ended this day dancing to the beat of Dene drummers around the sacred fire.

The next morning, we walked 13 kilometres along a highway to see the wounded Earth, tailings ponds, scarecrows, relentless canons and extraction plants. The drums kept our spirits up, but some could not help but weep. Seared in my memory is an image of 13-year-oldTa’Kaiya Blaney, a Sliammon First Nation actor, songwriter and singer. We stopped to rest, sitting in the grass by the roadside while Ta’Kaiya sat apart. For a long time, I watched her look out over the poisoned water at the belching smoke stacks. I imagined she was looking into her own future.

Ta’Kaiya, like many others, wore a mask during the walk; the air is foul. The grass was, too. The next morning, we saw angry red rashes on some people who sat on the grass wearing shorts.

At the end of the walk, Bill thanked the RCMP officers who had accompanied us. One said: “You guys are great. You’re doing a good thing.” And so we were. After a feast, the dancing went on half the night, sending our prayers out to the world.