Centuries ago, in a Gospel story being played out today, disciples were caught up in a violent, life threatening storm. The storm was actual and metaphorical as they were trying to change course in a boat and in their lives and needed a guide to do so. An actual violent, life threatening storm of our time in which we are trying to change course in our lives and in our world is climate change. We need guides to help us do so. Adding to the problem are those who deny there is a storm or that we need to change course. The deniers prevent all humanity from changing course – the new course being Care For Our Common Home. Care For Our Common Home, in Latin, Laudato Si (Praise Be) is the title of a recent encyclical written by Pope Francis.
Those in our own day who are caught up in the violent, life threatening storm of climate change live across the world. They live in Brazil and South Africa where the rise in temperatures will likely lead to a rise in malaria. They live in India where such temperatures have led to thousands of heat related deaths. They live in Pacific island states such Tuvalu where lives are threatened by rising ocean levels and the loss of coastal eco-systems. They farm in south Asia where they are being flooded out by excessive monsoons which then severely affects food production. They live in Southern Africa where extreme weather results in the same problem of hunger. Climate change is linked to extreme weather, floods, droughts, typhoons, loss of biodiversity, disease, homelessness, and political instability. The U.N. recently identified 32 nations at “extreme risk from climate change” including Bangladesh, South Sudan, Chad, Haiti, and Ethiopia, with all but two of the 32 also being classified as poor nations. Pope Francis has entered the storm as a guide by encouraging humanity to to change course – from exploiting people and resources to giving Care For Our Common Home. In the encyclical Francis gives special attention to the impact of climate change on those who are poor . He writes, there is an “intimate relationship between the poor and the fragility of the planet.” (#16) The deniers of climate change don’t so much live across the world as they live across a divide which the Pope, to their objection, all too willingly points out: “Many of those who possess more resources and economic or political power seem mostly to be concerned with masking the problems.” (#26) and, “some are concerned only with financial gain, and others with holding on to or increasing their power, … (not) caring for the environment and protecting those who are most vulnerable.” (#198)
Those who seek earthly control spread belief in a distant god with distant power that we lack. They assert power is external to us and thus there is nothing we can do about climate change. It is just the weather and that is God’s realm. They would have us be subject like Job in the first reading, granting mastery to a controlling god. But that god is the one the controlling class invented. They did so to justify exploiting people and resources. The deniers divert us from changing course and finding guides to help us do so.
Prayer: Spirit of Change, we have the power to engage with and calm any storm.
Question: What can I do or stop doing to change course on care for the environment?
June 21, 2015 Gospel Mark 4:35-41 Twelfth Sunday in Ordinary Time
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