11 21 11 Practical Spiritual Stuff

Introduction

I always say that any Christian message worth sharing needs to show itself in real life. Giving a sermon or a teaching doesn’t seem to have much value unless a connection can be made to authentic faith that shows itself in life. Whenever I am writing a sermon, or preparing a lesson plan for teaching, I am always asking myself, “so what? What difference does this make in how people really live?”

Last week I took some time to give a very brief theology for earth care. Today, I want to talk about some specifics. Since last week’s writings were about our dire need to change our behavior, because of the overwhelming consequences of human-driven climate change, talking about concrete actions has to happen.

I have already offered one concrete action, asking that you sign our petition calling for our government to follow through on regulating carbon as the law requires. You can still sign that petition at http://onepeopleoneearth.org.

Today, however, I want to talk about actions each of us can do to make a difference. It may be that politicians are incapable of taking action until after the people show the way. When it becomes politically expedient, they will act. If enough Americans begin living into the change they need, it will have an amazing impact on the planet, and an amazing impact on politics.

So I suggest that each of us look at taking action to affect climate change from two perspectives:

• things we can do to reduce our own use of carbon-based fuels, and
• things we can do to reduce the amount of transportation needed to get the products we need.[1]
  
  

Reducing Personal Use of Fossil Fuels

We all use fossil fuels in a variety of ways. Nearly all Alaskan electricity is generated with fossil fuels. Automobiles, four-wheelers, boats, airplanes and snowmobiles all make transportation in Alaska so much easier than ever before, but all burn petroleum fuel.

1. Keep up with light bulb technology. For most people that will mean both going to fluoresce nt light bulbs and finding stores that recycle them (fluorescents contain small amounts of mercury—very toxic—so proper recycling is necessary). Some may find that the new technology with LED lights is the way to go. Both use much les electricity than incandescent lights. LED uses amazingly less, but the technology is new enough that it is still very expensive. However, this will surely be the wave of the future.
   
   
   
2. Home Improvements
   The best way to begin may be by taking an energy audit. The churches that I have seen get an energy audit have found there are simple things they can do that greatly reduce the amount of energy they use, AND that the changes save the great amounts of money. For information on where to find an energy auditor, contact Interfaith Power and Light at www.akipl.org.
   
   
   An energy audit is valuable, because it tends to leave the property owner with two sets of goals—easy things one can do immediately and inexpensively, and longer range goals that one can think about and begin planning for. Even the short range goals make a difference. One Alaskan church figured they saved $6000 in fuel costs in the first year after the energy audit.
   
   
   Some things are so obvious they do not require an energy audit. Father Weise told of insulating the church in Wrangell, Alaska, built in 1909 without any insulation, at a cost of $70,000. The payback for this Alaskan church was less than ten years, AND the church and parsonage are so much more comfortable and welcoming, AND the church’s carbon footpring went down dramatically in one fell swoop.
   
   
   Also, take advantage of government supports for weatherizing homes. Currently there is also an energy upgrades, offering a 30% federal tax credit for most moves to solar heat or power. It is unlikely solar will replace 100% of energy use in Alaska. But it could replace a reasonable amount (maybe 25%) and easily pay for itself in the life of the building (actually, probably as fast as 12 years in Alaska—after 12 years it is all savings).
   
   
   
3. Reduce your own driving with motorized vehicles. Fr. Weise has taken to bicycling alm ost everywhere. It keeps him healthy, allows him to really “see” what is going on his community, and reduces his commuting CO₂ footprint to ZERO.
   
   
   For my part, I have found that my work allows me to work from home at least 20% of the time—sometimes more. Computers and telephones make so much possible!
   
   
   
4. In Alaska we need to upgrade our information-technology infrastructure. We need to be able to have web meetings to any place in Alaska. Too much of Alaska requires air transportat

   

   ion for face-to-face meetings, and air transportation is harder on the climate than any other ki nd of transportation. Today, we can do conference call meetings fairly well. But we could make technology-based meetings much more effective if we could increase the upload-download speed available to all communities off of the Alaska road system.
   
   
   
5. Other?
   I’m sure I am missing many more ideas. Maybe readers could post comments with other thoughts.
   
   

6. Use plastic judiciously. Plastic beaks into smaller and smaller pieces, but never biodegrades. All plastic ever manufactured still exists, if only in the dust we breathe. Some uses of plastic are essential. But most really are not. We need to be judicious and wise. SO:
1. Buy reusable grocery bags.
2. Look for condiments, etc. that come in glass jars/bottles rather than plastic.
3. When you do buy food in plastic containers, buy the ones that come in the plastics we can recycle (on the bottom, look for numbers 1 or 2—in Anchorage, at least).
4. When it comes time to do maintenance on your home consider using less plastic. For instance, when the time comes replace carpets (primarily plastic) and vinyl floors with cork, or bamboo or linoleum (linseed oil-based). All of these are fast-growing and renewable, and biodegradable. This saves the petroleum for something really needed.
   
   
   

Reducing the Transportation Needed for Commerce

Since transportation is so hard on the climate, we need to reduce the amount of transportation behind our Alaskan consumer goods. Here are a few suggestions. I’m sure you can think of more.

1. Don’t throw things away until you have to.
   I have heard financial advisors tell people that they can save so much money, if they just drive their cars “until they are piles of rust.” This may be a slight exaggeration, but the point is clear.
   
   
   Father Weise owns clothes that are decades old, and still wears them when the occasion merits it.
   
   
   
2. Try not to buy much of anything new.
   Value Village, Salvation Army and other used clothing and used goods dealers are very well organized these days. I have three sports jackets that I have purchased that way. A person can greatly reduce the carbon footprint needed by reusing perfectly good items like this.
   
   
   
3. Buy local as much as possible
   In Alaska, certain vegetables are tastier because of the sweetness colder climates instills in them, and cheap. I can’t grow potatoes and carrots as cheap as I can buy the local ones.
   
   
   Other “buy local” items are more expensive. However, if we all show a demand for local goods, the scale of production can go up, making them cheaper. If we make an effort it makes a difference. In Anchorage, the Alaska Food Challenge (see their Facebook Page) has caused restaurants to start offering “Local Produce” menus. We consumers can have an effect if we work together to name our values (buy local) and organize to get them noticed.
   
   
   At the very least, we need to stop buying foods not produced in North America. We now believe we “deserve” every convenience, including fruit produced in Chile or Australia and flown across the world. The world can’t stand that kind of decadence. And we don’t need it.
   
   
   
4. Get to know your neighbors
   The future really is dependent on relationships, and I will write more on this another day. However, there are two obvious earthcare needs that are met by building relationships with one’s neighbors.
   
   
   First, if you know your neighbors you can share a few expensive, or even not-so-expensive tools/products. I don’t need a snowplow 24/7. The same can be said for a wood splitter, table saw, wood chipper, backhoe, roto-tiller, and many other such items. Even a cup of sugar is really not so old-fashioned. For us it is an 18-mile round trip drive to the store. I would gladly lend a cup of sugar to any of our neighbors!
   
   
   Second, the more we live relationally in all aspects of our life—like at least getting to know your neighbors—the more it becomes a spiritual habit. Our spiritual habits affect how we see the world and how we live in it. It is this blog’s main point over the past six months.
   
   

Conclusion.

Interestingly, I find great religious connections in this. Christianity comes to us through two very distinct worldviews: that of the Hebrew culture that produced the Old Testament (or Hebrew Scriptures) and that of the Greek-influenced European culture, that so strongly embraced Christianity when it first appeared.

One rule of thumb for describing the significance of this difference is the difference in how the two cultures grasped what it means to “know.” For Greeks, knowing is what one grasps with the mind, so that one can think about it. For Hebrews, knowing showed itself in what one does. That is, for Hebrews, one could not be said to know a thing unless it showed itself in one’s actions.2

I have always been taught that ministry must show itself in terms of word (that is a description of what we believe and why that is important) and deed. The one seems more Greek, the other more Hebrew. A balance of both makes faith both understandable, and practical. I have also discovered that living out of a balance of both means that I have had to become a life-long student. Some of the things I do don’t work out so well. Then I dig deeper, studying myself and the world a bit more, and try again. In my view, that is what makes religion “real.”

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[1] For instance, organic food sounds green, but is not so green if food producers gather products from far continents (as Stonyfield does to produce its yogurt), burning fossil fuels rather than producing locally. Similarly, buying fruit out of season seems a wonder to this Alaska boy, who remembers decades past, when green apples and oranges were the only fruits available in the winter.

[2] “The distinction…arises from the difference between doing and knowing. The Hebrew is concerned with practice, the Greek with knowledge. Right conduct is the ultimate concern of the Hebrew, right thinking that of the Greek. Duty and strictness of conscience are the paramount things in life for the Hebrew; for the Greek, the spontaneous and luminous play of the intelligence. The Hebrew thus extols the moral virtues as the substance and meaning of life; the Greek subordinates them to the intellectual virtues…the contrast is between practice and theory, between the moral man and the theoretical or intellectual man." (William Barrett, Irrational Man)