Environment

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Of Bees and Being Human

Yesterday I saw a Monarch butterfly! What a perfectly named creature — regal, majestic, elegantly attired. Yes, I saw a butterfly. Remember when we were kids? We’d see hundreds of Monarchs along with many other kinds of butterflies, moths, bees, wasps as well as other flying bugs that only God knew what they were.

Sighting the solitary Monarch yesterday frightened me. Yes, a butterfly scared me! Where have they gone? And what about the birds? In our neighborhood, the incidental cardinals outnumber the sparrows — how crazy is that? Robbins evoke as much excitement from Minneapolitans in July as they do in March. Something is really wrong in The City of Lakes when we start valuing creatures by their absence!

The wholesale collapse of bee colonies is beginning to get some attention because of the essential role their pollinating serves in human food production. Wouldn’t you think we’d show more care and solicitude for “the help” who keep our lives functioning? As brazenly self-centered as it is, wouldn’t you think the demise of honeybees would wake us up to the fact that our own well-being might be similarly threatened?

The honeybee is a remarkably resilient species that has thrived for 40 million years but now they are in widespread collapse. They are like the proverbial canary in the coal mine. An [article] in the NYTimes corroborates why a solitary Monarch and the conspicuous absence of songbirds should be seen as harbingers of a larger catastrophe in the making.

It seems that any creature that flies is threatened by factors similar to those afflicting honeybees: heavy pesticide use, destruction of nesting sites by overly intensive agriculture, a lack of diverse nectar and pollen sources thanks to highly effective weed killers, wanton disregard for the eco-system bees depend on for nutrition.

According to the author of the NYTimes piece, the real issue is not primarily the number of problems but the interactions among them. Bees offer a lesson we ignore at our peril: the concept of synergy, where one plus one equals three, or four, or more.

“A typical honeybee colony contains residue from more than 120 pesticides. Alone, each represents a benign dose. But together they form a toxic soup of chemicals whose interplay can substantially reduce the effectiveness of bees’ immune systems, making them more susceptible to diseases.”

Our problem extends far beyond the tragic truth about bees.   The fatal effects of our agricultural obsessions (obscenities?) are reflected in the disappearance of butterflies and birds as well.  If they starve, we starve!

But it gets worse… a [study] released last month from UC-Davis is only the most recent to link proximity to agricultural pesticides in pregnancy to increased rates of Autism and other types of developmental delay among children. Regardless of age, we are what we eat.  And what we eat might just be killing us!

Those of us from a sacramental faith tradition, indeed all who profess faith in the God of Genesis, recognize that humans (literally, earth-creature and cognate of humus) have a special role and bear a unique responsibility for creation. Eco-spirituality is not a fad — it’s a moral duty!

Humility is a virtue hard to come by for most of us. The word has the same root as human and humus. We would do well to cultivate more of it. Humans have no “being” apart from this creation.  We begin by acknowledging that we are merely one part of God’s creation — one part, and one with sacred responsibilities.

The etiology of humility, human and humus affirms that at some deep intuitive level we “get it.”  We know in our bones that the way we relate to creation mirrors the way we relate to God.

We pray as we live… may it be “on earth as it is in heaven.”

 

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Jeb’s Lesson Plan

Every day, come hail or high water, Jeb the Dog takes me for a walk along Minnehaha Creek. Jeb is especially excited these days because record high water pushes the creek far beyond its banks. Need it be said that neighbors who feverishly tend sump pumps are not nearly as enthusiastic?

The high water enables Jeb to more easily greet Mama Mallard and her five ducklings. It gives him an edge in tormenting Mr. Snapping Turtle. Watching Jeb’s sheer exuberance and feverish freedom makes me wonder if our wonder-dog faithfully takes me to the creek to remind me of a basic truth:

When despair for the world grows in me
and I wake in the night at the least sound
in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
I go and lie down where the wood drake
rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
I come into the peace of wild things
who do not tax their lives with forethought
of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
And I feel above me the day-blind stars
waiting with their light. For a time
I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

Jeb’s been with us for almost three years now. He patiently but persistently labors to share with us many truths, adapting his lesson plan with the agility of a master teacher. His core message remains tediously consistent: We urgently need to acquire a new way of looking at ourselves, at the created world, and at God!

The environmental cliff on which we teeter suggests that our head-in-the-sand addiction to immediate gratification is not primarily economic (e.g., portfolio profits), political (e.g., re-election) or technical (e.g., “clean” energy) but spiritual. Jeb might say we are in need of a more fundamental transformation, conversion, metanoia, change-of-heart.

Just before our walk to the creek yesterday I was reading something by Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. He laments that we no longer see the world as gift of God or sacrament of divine presence. We no longer have Wendell Berry’s eyes or heart, becoming day-blind to the grace of the world.  We have become pretty hard-core secularists.

Record flooding on the creek tempts me to despair. At times I fear for our lives and what our children’s lives may be. Perhaps wood drakes, great herons and snapping turtles will do what patriarchs and poets apparently cannot.

Jeb, I need another walk!
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Wendell Berry, “The Peace of Wild Things” from The Selected Poems of Wendell Berry. Copyright © 1998.

Encountering the Mystery: Understanding Orthodox Christianity Today by Bartholomew, Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople. Doubleday. 2008. pp. xviii-xix. Continue reading →

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More than Blackberries

Victorian poet, Elizabeth Barrett Browning writes:

Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it, and pluck blackberries.

Theologians haggle over the “hypostatic union”. Those who truly comprehend the creation accounts of Genesis — or the Annunciation of Mary — spontaneously “find God in all things!”

To pray “on earth as it is in heaven” presumes we understand that to “have dominion” precludes domination and demands we protect the creation from every form of degradation.

Those from a Sacramental tradition are predisposed to encountering the Holy One in “stuff” like bread, oil, water, wine, food, drink; sensually in touch, smell, taste, sights and sounds.

Earth’s crammed with heaven,
And every common bush afire with God:
But only he who sees, takes off his shoes,
The rest sit round it, and pluck blackberries.

On this long lush summer day, take off your shoes and pray a while.

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Thanks go to Fr Dale Korogi for inspiring this reflection with his use of the Browning poem yesterday in his Corpus Christi homily at Christ the King Church.  The quote is from Bk. VII, l. 822-826 of Browning’s poetry.

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For God’s Sake… and Ours

If you have not read yesterday’s post, “What Are We to Say” please do so.  Because…

Today I want to lower frustration by emphasizing how concern for God’s creation — in and of itself without any self-referential pretense as if it were God’s “gift” to us, but rather “entrusted” to us for our care — cuts to the core of our spirituality and moral responsibilities.

By way of inspiration, I offer a quote from the Joint Declaration by Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew made from Jerusalem on May 25, 2014:

It is our profound conviction that the future of the human family depends also on how we safeguard – both prudently and compassionately, with justice and fairness – the gift of creation that our Creator has entrusted to us. Therefore, we acknowledge in repentance the wrongful mistreatment of our planet, which is tantamount to sin before the eyes of God. We reaffirm our responsibility and obligation to foster a sense of humility and moderation so that all may feel the need to respect creation and to safeguard it with care. Together, we pledge our commitment to raising awareness about the stewardship of creation; we appeal to all people of goodwill to consider ways of living less wastefully and more frugally, manifesting less greed and more generosity for the protection of God’s world and the benefit of His people.

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You may read the entire ten-paragraph statement by Francis and Bartholomew [here].

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What Are We to Say?

Imagine, 74 grand nephews and nieces! Yes, my 34 nephews and nieces collectively have 74 children. In fact I’m so old, and my family so prolific, that some of my nephews and nieces are grandparents!

Though I have no children of my own, I take my avuncular role seriously and this is the source of a recurring anxiety. Often I shutter and am down-right scared. I envision my grand nieces and nephews when they are my age. With creased brow and shaking head they ask, “What were you thinking? Were you blind? Why the hell didn’t you do something?”

Perhaps this blog is preemptory self-defense… I imagine one or more of the 74 — perhaps my namesake, Richard James — combing through these posts in fifty years. Ideally, they will constitute something of an ethical testament. We were not totally oblivious, self-consumed and ignorant. Were we?

If I am not careful you will soon stop reading, reflexively click the “close” button. Please don’t! My challenge is to remain engaging about a topic that should scare us to death. Otherwise, how are we to explain to Richard James in 2064 that not all of us lived in the United States of Amnesia!

Moments ago, morning news reported on Mankato, MN — home of a state university as well as the billionaire owner of the NBA Minnesota Twins. The Minnesota River which runs through town was already swollen above flood stage by unseasonably high precipitation. Seems the river and city sewer systems simply could not accommodate seven inches of additional rain. The city is shut down. Crops on more than 100,000 acres of nearby farmland have also been lost.

Sad… tragic, in fact! Thank God no deaths have been reported. The Red Cross and National Guard immediately responded. Families are regrouping and neighborhoods will collectively shovel mud from homes. Mankato will be declared a national disaster area and FIMA will help return the community to some semblance of the status quo.

Then, I fear — and this is the source of my worst fear — we will all return to our respective states of amnesia. Civic leaders will don smiles for Fourth of July parades on Main Street. Banners will proclaim, “Mission Accomplished.” We will collectively settle back to our routines because good hands are taking care of us.

Please resist the sudden urge to “close”! There is overwhelming evidence that all is not right with the world: ice caps are shrinking, glaciers are receding, sea levels rising, permafrost thawing, species of plants and animals vanishing. This is happening amid sustained droughts, heavy rains, heat waves, wildfires, floods and unforeseen threats to food production.

Here’s the blunt truth expressed by Colman McCarthy: “From the grimness, it’s not a wild conclusion that earthicide is happening — the self-destruction caused by human choices…  carbon dioxide is causing the planet to gag, as if gasping for air that for billions of years was breathable but is no longer.”  Writing amid yet another heavy rain I envision this as creation’s desperate convulsion to cleanse itself of the filth and degradation of ravenous human consumption.

As we gather along Main Street for Fourth of July parades and assemble lawn chairs for fireworks displays we might ask: “What will history say about our generation?” Will our sense of civic duty recede with the last strains of a John Philip Sousa march? Will we simply fold up our lawn chairs and return to our respective states of amnesia?

What response will we have for our grandchildren in 2064? What are we to say to Richard James, … or Eleanor, … or Jack, … or Graham, … or Paige, …?

They need our answer NOW!

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Gore Vidal coined the term “United States of Amnesia.”

The quote from Colman McCathy is from an essay well worth reading [link]

 

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A Master Teacher

Yesterday Jeb the Dog did what he does every day of the year – he took me for a walk around Minnehaha Creek. Whether blustery cold on a typical December day, rainy as usual in April or exquisitely perfect as it was yesterday Jeb is ecstatic because he knows how much I appreciate what he shares with me each day.

Four o’clock sun sent long shafts through cascading willows. A snapping turtle, big as a turkey platter, stubbornly refused Jeb’s excited and extended self-introduction. Delicate violets and pert bluebells have given way to substantial growth below an intensely green canopy. Frighteningly fast currents compensate with sounds seldom heard on the generally somnolent creek. Off-leash in violation of city ordinance, Jeb flashes a telling glance, “This is paradise!”

Science validates the primordial explosion of creative energy that got things going 13.7 billion years ago. Ten billion years later a second creative burst hatched life on Earth. The land produced vegetation: plants bearing seed according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds. And God saw that it was good.  And there was evening, and there was morning—the third day. (Gen 1:12-13)

The truth of this story lies deeply planted in the air we breathe and our very bones. On the fourth day God created the sun and moon. Living creatures took to the air and swam in the sea on the fifth day. All the many creatures that move upon the ground – certainly the forebears of that stubborn snapping turtle – made their debut on the sixth day. Throughout, God remains quite pleased and affirmed that all is very, very good!

Yesterday it was as if Jeb were taking me to that precise hour on the sixth day – that majestic moment when God’s fecundity is awash and extravagant, that pregnant moment just before humankind appears on the scene. Science now documents this period — between the dawn of life on the third day and right before humanity’s dramatic debut later on the sixth day — lasting for about three billion years.

The Psalmist evokes praise for this cosmic time in recalling “For a thousand years in your sight are but as yesterday when it is past, or as a watch in the night.” (Psalm 90:4) We cannot help but wonder about the spiritual meaning and moral significance of this pristine epoch prior to humankind – a world drenched with vibrant diversity and teeming vitality! How are we to reverence this heritage which resides in our bones and saturates the air we breathe?

This is the place theologian Elizabeth A. Johnson takes us as well in Ask the Beasts: Darwin and the God of Love. Once we encounter the primordial community of life which is equally God’s creation we recognize that our disregard constitutes a grievous omission if not an unspeakable sin.  How can we remain blithely self-centered, ravenously ungrateful, wantonly destructive?

That snapping turtle, the verdant trees and a cascading creek have much to teach. I am eager for Jeb the Dog, my master teacher, to take me for another lesson. I have a lot to learn!

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That incisive image of “unspeakable sin” is directly from Elizabeth Johnson whose book I am now reading and which I highly recommend to any who care to wade through a bit of academic theologizing to get to the spiritual nourishment which we all need.

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“Ask the Beasts”

You deserve better. We all do! If you are a regular here you are quite aware of my consternation and frustration about what’s happening with our environment. If my tone has been off-putting please read on. I’m excited and this should influence what you read here in the weeks ahead. We all want and deserve reasons for hope.

Although I have alluded to it before, only today have I ordered (you probably know about cash-flow, too) the latest book by one of my favorite theologians, Elizabeth A. Johnson, CSJ. She is the one who first turned me on to the insight that the Hebrew words for mercy and womb share the same root. She also gives the doctrinal watchdog in the Vatican headaches. Does she need any further endorsement?

The book is Ask the Beasts: Darwin and the God of Love. Although the cost for the Kindle version is half that of a hard copy, I splurged because this is a book I will want to mark up and return to often. Experience has taught me this is the best way to savor Elizabeth Johnson’s meticulous work.

Given the title, we might assume the book is about the contentious issue of Darwinism versus Creationism, science versus God. It’s not! According to a thorough and inspiring review by Julia Balamut on the Amazon.com site, Johnson only uses these issues as background for her intelligently argued and beautifully written testament to the wonder of God’s creation.

As the rigourous scholar that she is, Johnson has the utmost respect for the advances in scientific breakthroughs through the human genome project and new discoveries about cell biology.  The Fordham University professor is quite comfortable acknowledging that Darwin was right all along in his life-long study of the origins of life.

Balamut praises Johnson’s careful and respectful separation of the Genesis accounts of creation from modern science. Johnson readily admits that science convincingly demonstrates that it is scientifically unlikely that an intelligent designer spontaneously created life as we know it today.

Yet, she just as convincingly argues using the Christian Nicene creed that God in the Son and Spirit is the “Creator,” of not just humanity but of all the wonders of the natural world. As the committed woman of faith she is, Johnson uses Scripture and humankind’s persistent quest for meaning and insight to show God’s ever present hand in science and nature.

If you are looking for another heated debate about Science vs. Religion and how a scientist can’t possibly have a strong spiritual life or how a religious person can’t possibly believe something if it didn’t factually happen as written in the Bible, this isn’t the book for you. There is plenty of that in the media already.

Befitting her status as a masterful teacher, Professor Johnson implores and inspires us to strive with all our intelligence, faith, hope, and love to honor and protect God’s marvelous creation.

I cannot wait for my copy to arrive! Our earth deserves better from us. Elizabeth Johnson has shown us the Way to which our faith calls us.

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I am deeply indebted to Julia Balamut for her comprehensive review and recommend it to you in its entirety [here].

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For the Class of 2056

How can it possibly be 42 years? But it is! Forty-two years ago today I graduated from Creighton University with a B.A. in Political Science.

I was able to earn enough during the summer to pay my private school tuition. I spent a few nights a week at a mortuary and worked a few funerals for spending money through the school year. Living at home with my parents saved room and board expenses.

How things have changed! I graduated from Creighton with $800 in student loans, all incurred during my freshman year. A little over 70% of this year’s bachelors degree recipients – from public as well as private schools – are leaving with loans totaling $33,000 on average!

That really concerns me! It should concern all of us. Imagine what it’s like to be saddled with that sort of debt right out of the starting gate. Seems to me this is evidence of some pretty serious fraying of the social contract we have with one another in this country.

If I were invited to give a commencement address this year I would, of course, touch on that topic. I would also be strongly influenced by the fact that I would be speaking to my grandchildren’s generation. Forty-two years! I would certainly attempt the impossible in my address – to convince the young graduates just how fast life happens.

If I were speaking to the Creighton Class of 2014 I would undoubtedly reinforce the Ignatian character of their education, especially how they are meant to use their talent and education to serve others and promote justice.

I would find some way to explain – despite how hard we think we each have worked for our degrees – how any one of us who had the opportunity to graduate from Creighton was born on third base and should never think we hit a triple.

From the perspective of 42 years and how fast it all happens, I would remind them of something from the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. There Ignatius encourages us to consider our actions or choices from the perspective of our deathbed – then and there, when it’s all over, what will I wish I would have done? I have found this to be an almost infallible guideline for making good choices.

There appears from my vantage point a fraying in the “social contract” we have with fellow Americans. Saddling young people with tens of thousands of dollars of debt is simply unsustainable, if not immoral. Our obstinate denial of the consequences of our consumption of natural resources is unconscionable.

What will the Creighton Class of 2056 hear from their commencement speaker? That day will be here before we know it. Today, 2014, what will we wish we would have done for these future graduates?

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“Graciousness Draping the World”

Admittedly, recent postings here have been challenging and intense. My consistent motivation remains – to stimulate awareness and action. My conviction is that no one of us can do everything, but we all must do something!  It’s as simple as “Love your neighbor as yourself.” I also believe in the cliché, “You can only do what you can do”…  as long as it is not a cop-out!

Favorite nephews and nieces come to mind… they are building careers, serving communities, committed to marriages, raising kids. Their generosity and dedication inspire me. In them I learn just how challenging it is in our culture to introduce the verb, “to share” into the vocabulary of young children. Courage! Keep it up! You can only do what you can do! But in doing so you are your children’s first and best teachers about loving God and loving others.   Good job!

Today my heart is sick over the 326 young girls kidnapped on April 15 in northern Nigeria. They were taken by armed terrorists from their boarding school because “western education is a sin.” Fifty girls have escaped. Reports indicate the others are being auctioned off for $12 each to become “wives” of militants.

But there is something known as “compassion fatigue”! We can only do what we can do. We can only care so much until we burn out.  But if you are not yet aware of this horror playing out in the lives of these young girls, I ask that you at least take a look at Nicholas Kristof’s compelling report [here].

Today is Sunday, a day for Sabbath rest. It’s a good day to remember the fullness of the love command – Love your neighbor as yourself! In that spirit I share something that has long been a favorite of mine. Take a rest. Enjoy your day! Show some well-deserved love for yourself. Take care of tomorrow, tomorrow… 

I think we who work for justice and come face to face regularly with its negation are at risk of losing that which animates all healthy beings: the capacity to respond to the graciousness draping the world in colors vivid and electric, the warmth of the sun, a lover’s touch. If we neglect to notice these, why attend to anything else?  

E.B. White said, “Every morning I awake torn between a desire to save the world and an inclination to savor it. That makes it hard to plan the day.” But if we forget to savor the world, what possible reason do we have for saving it? In a way, the savoring must come first. 

Shortly before he died, [the noted Nigerian environmentalist and human rights activist] Ken Saro-Wiwa wrote from prison to a friend: “I’m in good spirits. … There is no doubt that my idea will succeed in time, but I’ll have to bear the pain of the moment. … I’m mentally prepared for the worst but hopeful for the best. I think I have the moral victory.”  

He did, of course, but he also lost his life in its pursuit. Think of that and weep, but then take the hand of a child, beam over a rose and shout praises to the stars. And then begin again. Begin again. No better tribute could there be to all that is right and proud and free. 

— William F. Schulz, Former Executive Director, Amnesty Internatoinal

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Out and About

I’m feeling a little defensive! I know the church celebrates Easter for eight days. My encounter with the Risen One isn’t happening in church. In the past I would have dutifully prayed with the Scriptures assigned for each day of the week in the Lectionary. No more! Regulars here may recognize that this week I could be accused of giving more credence to Earth Day than to Easter. They would be right!

I shouldn’t feel defensive! My Ignatian roots compel me to “Find God in all things.” Christian faith is all about “sacraments” – outward tangible signs, gestures and “stuff” that manifest grace. Earlier this week I referenced the Genesis creation accounts and recalled that Christians profess faith in One so intimate with creation that God becomes incarnate in Jesus to bring all creation to fulfillment in Christ. If any Scripture resonates through my ecological Easter it is Ephesians 8:19-24:

Creation waits in eager expectation for the sons of God to be revealed…. that the creation itself will be liberated from its bondage to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of the children of God.We know that the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains of childbirth right up to the present time. Not only so, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly as we wait eagerly for our adoption as sons, the redemption of our bodies. For in this hope we were saved.

I guess I’m in good company. Dejected disciples recognized Christ on their trek back home to Emmaus and in the act of sharing bread. The great apostle Paul encountered the Risen One en route to Damascus. Thomas and the rest of the gang come to Easter faith hidden away behind locked doors. And the very first among them all, Mary of Magdala thought she was seeing the gardener.

Why would it be any different for us? As the angel said to those coming to the tomb, “He is not here! He is Risen.” Why do I feel defensive about One who is out and about, showing up in places and with folks we wouldn’t expect (or maybe even approve of), in places we would least expect but where we need Him most!