"Creation flavored" thoughts on the lectionary texts
Follow up from last week - I was sitting in church Sunday listening to the guy read the Gospel and it hit me - gain,
growth, ground, bankers, interest. James Gustave Speth in
The Bridge at the Edge of the World (http://www.thebridgeattheedgeoftheworld.com/) notes "In a capitalist economy, survival requires growth..." And "basically, the economic system does
not work when it comes to protecting environmental resources, and the political system does not work when it comes to correcting
the economic system." Bill McKibben suggests the era of the growth paradigm is over. Ilargi on
The Automatic
Earth claims "The Growth Paradigm Has Become an Embarrassment".
http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/ So who is the hero of this story? If the point of the story is to "use what you have to make more", why would
Jesus have had to tell it? What other options are there for "the point of the story"? Could the third slave/servant
- standing up (with the 99%!) to protest an unjust and environmentally damaging system - really be the hero?
Date: November 20, 2011 (which is 11.20.2011, "eleven
twenty twenty eleven" - works better saying it than writing it!)
(note corresponding EarthWords from 3 years ago archived on the website)
Text: Psalm 100
Thoughts
"Make a joyful noise..." along with all God's children (human, other, living, non-living). And then take a moment
of silence to hear in your mind the voices of those no longer with us. (MIT professor Stephen Meyer in
The End of
the Wild http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=10941 : "Over the next hundred years or so as many as half of the earth's species, representing a quarter of the planet's
genetic stock, will functionally if not completely disappear. The land and the oceans will continue to teem with
life, but it will be a peculiarly homogenized assemblage of organisms unnaturally selected for their compatibility with one
fundamental force: us. Nothing...can change the current course. The broad path for biological evolution is now
set for the next several million years. And in this sense the extinction crisis - the race to save the composition,
structure, and organization of biodiversity as it exists today - is over, and we have lost.") Ok, let's try to get back
to "joyful" noise!
All the lands, and all the peoples, critters, that inhabit these lands. What's your attitude, understanding of
this? Is the land yours/ours to buy, own, use (hopefully, well!), sell; or does the land belong to someone/thing else
(the people, the Creation, the Creator) and is yours to live with, care for, improve; or ????? (More on our relationship
to the land below.)
We are God's people. How would it be different if it said "we are God's creatures"?
"We are sheep of God's pasture" - I have always taken this poetically, metaphorically. What if it's meant
literally. What if this is sort of a litany and our line is "We are God's people", and then the sheep bleat "We
are God's sheep", and then the salmon burble "We are God's fish", and then the chickadees chirp "We are God's birds",
and then the rapids gurgle "We are God's streams", and then the mountains ... well, you get the idea. And we all
say together - "It is God that made us; we belong to God."
"Enter God's gates and courts." Probably meant to be a judgment type setting. I always think of it as "courtyard"
with shade trees, a fountain, benches.
God's steadfast love endures forever, to all generations. Does that mean "as long as we're here"? What happens
to God's love if/when we are no longer around? Is God's love then for whatever is left? Whatever comes next?
"To all generations" - how is our faithfulness to coming generations doing? (I guess I'd say, not so well.
As Arlo Guthrie said, "And that's being kind and generous. And that's being on tv!")
Text: Ezekiel 34.11-16,20-24
Thoughts
So again I guess we are all hoping the literalists are wrong and this is really metaphor. What if it really is
the sheep that God is looking for?
The sheep have a land they belong to. What about you and me? Do we have a land that we belong to?
Pasture on the mountain heights. Sounds a little contradictory, but nice.
Text: Matthew 25.31-46
Thoughts
Ditto the line about metaphor! Of course if the sheep, goats, and shepherd are figments of our metaphor, what about
the throne, kingdom, eternal fire?
"You gave me no food, no water to drink" - What about when the soil plays out due to mono-cropping and heavy chemical
inputs? What about when the aquifer gets pumped out, or polluted? (One year delay on the Keystone XL - better
than nothing, not as good as canceling it outright!) "The United Nations estimates that an area larger than Canada or
China suffers from some degree of desertification and that each year fifty million acres become too degraded for crop production
or are lost to urban sprawl That's an area the size of Nebraska." (Bridge, p31) And again, "The
EPA estimates that if current American water use remains constant at a hundred gallons per person per day, thirty-six states
will face water shortages by 2013." (p33) Wait a minute - that's just a long year away. (Something about that
seemed familiar to me - then I checked last week's EarthWords and saw the warning about a bank crisis in November and the
"Wait a minute..." comment. Somehow these "Wait a minute, that's just around the corner" awarenesses are coming more
and more frequently!)
So - how will those who planted a garden treat those who didn't when the food system locks up? How will those of
us who live by water treat those who are thirsty? And here's the really discouraging/disturbing line that comes next
after the "water shortage" quote above - "As a result, humanity's "first need" will soon be privatized. Investors are
moving into a water-related market that is estimated to be worth at least $150 billion in the United States by 2010.
(Wait a minute - that was last year!) "Water is a growth driver for as long and as far as the eye can see," a Goldman
Sachs water analyst told the New York Times in 2006." Enough said. Well I thought it was enough, but then I was
googling Goldman Sachs just to make sure, and here was the headline - "Goldman Sachs's Blankfein Says World Growth Will 'Snap
Back' "
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/g/a/2011/11/15/bloomberg_articlesLUPTXH6K50YJ.DTL
Both those on the left and those on the right are taken away to someplace else. Hello - there is no someplace else.
We're here for the long haul. Maybe we should start taking better care of the land/planet we belong to.
Prayer
God of eternal Creation, eternal love, eternal justice,
it is easy for us to join the sheep, the chickadee, the mountains, the waves, the cattle, the cats and dogs
in Creation's song of praise
because you are continually working to keep/bring Creation into balance.
As it becomes more clear where we have trampled the pasture
and muddied the waters,
help us respond to your inconceivably gracious invitation
to live here
with less
and be a blessing instead of a blight.
One Thing to Do This Week
