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Category: the natural world

pursuing all of the agenda of jesus

pursuing all of the agenda of jesus

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It is refreshing to hear of Christian leaders who are not boxed in by particular political constituencies, right or left, who are eager to follow where Jesus leads.

My quarrel with the religious right is that is often a lot more right than religious, that its priorities seem determined more by political ideology than genuine faith. So it was refreshing to hear today the concerns of mega-church pastor Joel Hunter. Hunter is a nationally-known leader in evangelical circles, recently tapped as the next president of the Christian Coalition.

Hunter has resigned the position, citing “differences in philosophy and vision.” He sought to broaden the agenda of the Coalition, to chart a new direction for the organization, addressing not only abortion and gay marriage, but also what he calls “all the agenda of Jesus, the compassion issues as well as the moral issues,” issues of poverty and care for the environment.

When we listen to Jesus, there is hope. There is hope that we will not get stuck in entrenched ideological warfare, but be able to listen to each other as we listen together to Jesus. People like Joel Hunter raise my hopes for future of the church.

The Christian Coalition’s founder, Pat Robertson, has done much to bring public shame to the name, “Christian,” with his narrow-visioned, arrogant, and even hateful pronouncements. Whether you agree or not with Joel Hunter’s positions on the issues — and quite frankly, I know very little other than what I have gleaned from this report — his humility, his sensitivity to the message of Jesus, and his desire to unite, not further divide, the followers of Jesus, is refreshing.

Listen to the NPR report and read a summary of the story.

early fallout from global warming

early fallout from global warming

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By Seth Borenstein, AP Science Writer | November 21, 2006

WASHINGTON — Animal and plant species have begun dying off or changing sooner than predicted because of global warming, a review of hundreds of research studies contends.

These fast-moving adaptations come as a surprise even to biologists and ecologists because they are occurring so rapidly.

At least 70 species of frogs, mostly mountain-dwellers that had nowhere to go to escape the creeping heat, have gone extinct because of climate change, the analysis says. It also reports that between 100 and 200 other cold-dependent animal species, such as penguins and polar bears are in deep trouble.

“We are finally seeing species going extinct,” said University of Texas biologist Camille Parmesan, author of the study. “Now we’ve got the evidence. It’s here. It’s real. This is not just biologists’ intuition. It’s what’s happening.”

Read the rest of Borenstein’s article about the findings of Camille Parmesan’s study.

We are not powerless to reverse the effects or at least the momentum of global warming, but we must act soon, or it may be too late. We means all of us, all of us acting in concert, which means all of us as represented by a government of, by, and for the people. We must not ignore the evidence, downplay the threat, stall for time. We have to act now and acting now requires that we admit there is a problem, a crisis.

We can take baby steps as individuals, to reduce our “carbon footprint,” to offset our contribution to atmospheric greenhouse gases by investing in carbon-reduction technologies, but only acting together can we make reasonable headway to slow the momentum of global warming, only if our national leaders take it seriously and take action.

Too many of God’s creatures are already paying the price for our inaction …

the colors of the sea

the colors of the sea

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Another favorite Monhegan Island photograph. Don’t miss the gulls at the upper left! I especially love the color — the colors! — of the sea.

Monhegan Island shoreline

Click on the photo to see an enlarged image.

a view through the trees

a view through the trees

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ocean view through the trees on Monhegan Island

I like this photograph.

It is different from most of my other Monhegan photos — no stunning cliffs rising from the sea, no waves exploding on the rocks guarding the shoreline, no colorful lilies or picturesque lighthouses or interesting people — just this view through the trees.

Is it a photograph of the sea or is the sea just the background? Is our attention drawn by the dead tree in the foreground or do we see past the tree? Is it the dark lines of the dead tree or the bold greens of the living trees or orange of the lichen-covered rocks, the expansive sea in the distance or the intimate path in the near corner, that makes this photograph beautiful?

It is all these things. It is the way all the pieces of the photograph “fit” together and don’t fit together. It is the juxtaposition of life and death, of soft and hard, of light and dark, of sharp and smooth, of intimacy and immensity, that makes this photograph engaging … and beautiful. It is beautiful because it shows something real, this particular piece of earth as it is, as it has become, not something put together or composed by the artist, but something already there. Here is the artistry … of God: death and life, immediacy and transcendence, something that exists wholly oblivious to and careless of me, and yet of which, when I am present and when I pay attention, I am a part.

This is what we are like, too — products of God’s artistry, a strange juxtaposition of the heavenly and the mundane, full of contradictions, but beautiful as we are, beautiful because we are, beautiful because we are from God.

arctic national wildlife refuge under siege

arctic national wildlife refuge under siege

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Once again the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is under threat. Some people just don’t understand “No!” No, it is not worth it to us to add a few more gallons to our oil reserves if it means the sacrifice of this precious piece of wilderness.

a tank full of gas: $60
drilling a new oil well: $5 million
preserving the home of the caribou, the black bear, the moose, the Dall mountain sheep, the Gwich’in Indian: priceless

In the words of the our own government (from the U.S. Fish and Wildlife website):

Arctic National Wildlife Refuge was established to preserve unique wildlife, wilderness and recreational values; to conserve caribou herds, polar bears, grizzly bears, muskox, dall sheep, wolves, snow geese, peregrine falcons, other migratory birds, dolly varden, and grayling; to fulfill international treaty obligations; to provide opportunities for continued subsistence uses; and to ensure necessary water quality and quantity.

placeholder for flash movie

an inconvenient truth

an inconvenient truth

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movie posterWe saw Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth tonight. It is a clear and thorough, sobering and hopeful, account of the looming crisis of global warming and our capacity as a human race to address its dangers.

It should be seen, because the problem of global warming needs to be understood and faced. As one of my college classmates has stated, global warming is no more or less a theory than gravity is a theory! The scientific community is in agreement: the planet is warming at an unprecedented rate and the cause is the increased level of carbon dioxide in the earth’s atmosphere. And the consequences of uncurbed warming at the current levels would be disastrous, globally disastrous.

The facts are there to be seen, but we are often good at ignoring the facts when such ignorance lets us avoid a change in personal behavior. Gore is right: global warming is not a political issue; it is a moral issue. Ignorance is not an option. Hopelessness is not an option. Apathy is not an option … unless we wish to bring the guilt of causing the suffering of future generations down on our heads.

See the movie. And check out the website: http://www.climatecrisis.net/. I wish the film had been less politically self-serving — Gore very much promotes himself throughout the film — but this distraction takes nothing away from the power and timeliness and persuasiveness and may I say, the righteousness, of his message.