Soil & Sacrament: Fred Bahnson & Shamu Sadeh - Thurs at St. John the Divine

Dear friends,

I am writing to invite you by a talk by Fred Bahnson, author of Soil and Sacrament, this upcoming Thursday at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine.  Fred will be joined by Shamu Sadeh, the Jewish farmer who was featured in the Adamah chapter of Soil and Sacrament.

Thursday, March 10, 2016
7 PM – 8:30 PM, Cathedral of St. John the Divine

1047 Amsterdam Avenue at 112th Street

https://www.stjohndivine.org/visit/calendar/events/events/13339/soil-and-sacrament-fred-bahnson-in-conversation

I first learned about Fred and his work several years ago.  I was impressed by the work of the Institute for Agriculture & Trade Policy, and happened to be searching through the list of Food & Community Fellows when I found Fred's profile and his work on understanding the faith community's role in the food movement.  Not too long after, I learned about a book he co-authored with Norman Wirzba, Making Peace with the Land: God's Call to Reconcile with Creation.

Last year, several colleagues informed me of Fred's Re:Generate Fellowship program through the Wake Forest University School of Divinity's Food, Faith & Religious Leadership Initiative which he directs.  I was accepted to the program, and spent one of the most fulfilling weeks of my life last summer in the hills of North Carolina in true fellowship, learning and sharing and envisioning a "New Heaven, New Earth" with the other fellows and program participants. 

Fred has become a dear mentor of mine, who through profound spiritual conversion has developed a true gift for articulating the inextricable link between "our yearning for real food" and "our spiritual desire to be fed" as we seek to be truly alive.  I feel a deep sense of peace and shalom in the work of bringing people closer to the adamah from which we come, and am so grateful for his leadership in this endeavor.  I still have much to learn from him.

I hope you will be able to come and listen to Fred and Shamu speak this Thursday at St. John the Divine. Please spread the word to others who may be interested as well!

Peace -- and Shalom,

Kelly

What is Enough?

It’s two days after Thanksgiving and one day after what is commonly known as “Black Friday” here in the U.S.  Meanwhile, the climate justice pilgrims have just completed their journey from Rome to Paris on foot for the People’s Pilgrimage, bringing the voices of people of faith from across the world to Paris for the COP-21 climate negotiations, with the message that the United Nations must pass a strong climate treaty. 

I find myself joining other OurVoices leaders in asking the question, “What is enough?” 

How is it that we choose to be thankful for a day every year, and then we allow ourselves to continue to live in a society that turns around the next day, with people knocking one another over in the quest to get the best deal on the latest gadget? 

I have always understood that the holidays are a time to be grateful for what we have, for family, friends, nourishing food and the opportunities provided for us in our lives.  A time to sober ourselves to the reality that there are billions of people across the planet who are hungry and living in poverty, subject to the whims of an unstable climate caused in large part by our unsustainable lifestyles.  Given these realities, to me the materialistic frenzy that surrounds the holidays is too harmful to just be written off as shallow.  

I am grateful for growing up with a religious orientation that taught me the love of God for all people, and through which I eventually came to understand the spiritual and ecological interconnectedness of all people and aspects of creation to one another.   My experiences and those of many other spiritually conscious people have convicted me that faith, religion, and spirituality allow any of us to transform ourselves into more compassionate human beings, and that this transformation is exactly what our religious and spiritual traditions were created for.   When we do not pay attention to this reality and instead focus on the inflatable Christmas lawn decorations and long wish lists for Santa Claus and his elves, we are betraying the very purpose of the holi-day.  Americans spend more than $600 billion during the holiday season, causing some to believe Christmas is synonymous with materialism.

How did we get to this point, and what will it take for us to return to the real meaning of the holiday season….and pass strong climate legislation?

I like returning to St. Nicholas, from whom the story of Santa Claus was born.  As legend has it, when Nicholas learned of a poor man who could not afford a proper dowry for his three daughters, he decided help them. He secretly threw three purses filled with gold coins through the window of the family’s house in order to help prevent the women from remaining unmarried, becoming prostitutes or being assumed to be prostitutes.  To me this is far cry from what our society has manufactured, which somehow ties a spinoff of the legend of St. Nicholas together with a celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ in a stable in Nazareth, into a “holiday” celebrated by Christians and non-Christians alike that does more harm than good for God’s creation, or to use the term popularlized by Pope Francis, “our common home.”   Not to mention completely looking past the deeper spiritual messages that Jesus preached about and stood for through his incarnation as the Christ.  

For a moment, let us pause at the wonders of the sacred world we are privileged to live in.  

For me, this is enough.

As we return to thinking about the season of gift-giving, wouldn’t we do better to celebrate the holidays by following the example of St. Nicholas, who gave of himself to protect the welfare and dignity of young women?   Given how our actions create ripple effects, our unsustainable lifestyles are directly connected to instances of human trafficking across the world:  as I have learned from Franciscans International, areas where mining of precious minerals occurs are also hot spots for human trafficking.  Instead of asking for the latest electronics or fashion items from the local mall this year, what if we replaced our selfish desires with means of combating instances which destroy the lives and self-esteems of our global brothers and sisters?  This year, for those who insist on buying me gifts for Christmas, I’ll be asking for products and services that help girls get to primary or secondary school safely through Global Girlfriend.   And no gift-wrapping, please.   In the meantime, I’ll be praying for a strong climate treaty at COP-21, with the awareness that we must put our prayers and Pope Francis’ words of Laudato Si’ into action in order to realize a better world.

Faith in Action Food Summit: October 22

Breaking Bread Together to Address Hunger & Health

Faith calls us to be present to the world’s realities: a faith life which is disconnected from the needs of one’s physical body and the world around us is not good for one’s physical or spiritual well-being. Instead, we are called to create communities where everyone is free from disease, no one goes hungry, workers are treated well, and where children are nourished and ready to succeed. In such a community, people can eat with dignity around the table together, and food is affordable and accessible for all. This is the world we are called to co-create with the universal Creator. National Food Day – a nation-wide celebration of real food – is an opportunity for faith leaders to come together to celebrate real food and see what we can do to create a food system that feeds and nourishes with the bounty of the earth, rather than one that harms human health and the ecosystems surrounding us.

The Bronx Multi-Faith Advisory Group cordially invites you to gather for a Faith in Action Food Summit on October 22nd from 10am-1pm at the Bronx Museum of the Arts (1040 Grand Concourse, Bronx NY 10456). This is an opportunity for faith leaders to gain a deeper understanding of the ways people of faith can get involved in creating an equitable and sustainable food system that promotes health and reduces hunger. The Summit will equip participants with messages that can be taken back to congregations the following weekend, putting Bronx-based efforts to create a holistic food system on the map alongside others from across the country who will also be celebrating Food Day, which is held every year on October 24.

We hope you will be able to join us. Please RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/bronx-faith-in-action-food-summit-registration-18785766734

Faith and the Environmental Justice Movement: A Franciscan Perspective

Catholics are natural allies in the struggle for environmental justice.  As a Catholic, I have been most drawn to the example of St. Francis of Assisi, who is our tradition’s patron saint of the environment. St. Francis, who followed Jesus’ call to leave everything behind and live a life of intentional poverty and simplicity, lived in a medieval world where people, who had previously enjoyed a more intimate bond with their ecosystems, began to be disconnected from the land as a result of extensive land holdings owned and controlled by the small minority in the ruling class.  This separation of people from the land, coupled with abuse of power, led to oppression and a class of poor deprived of their humanity and dignity.

Francis’ identification with the poor gradually brought him to an understanding of his place as a “little brother” to all humanity and all creation. His famous “Canticle of the Creatures,” which is the inspiration for Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’, reveals how integrally interconnected St. Francis felt to all elements of God’s creation. He came to see God reflected in all of creation and therefore sought to maintain the integrity of all creation.

The essence of Franciscan spirituality, then, is a focus on seeing God in everyone, especially the marginalized, and working toward protecting the integrity of all creation. Therefore, by working to maintain the integrity of all creation—with particular emphasis on the poor, vulnerable, and those least responsible for environmental degradation—Franciscan spirituality lends itself to a focus on environmental and climate justice.

Through St. Francis’ commitment to following the convictions of his faith, he consciously joined the “story of power,” which is the story of humans and creation that also “includes a focus on the differences of status, privilege, social class, levels of influence, wealth and political and social power of various groups” (Franciscan Care for Creation).  This is the story that continues through the environmental justice movement today.

Environmental justice communities have a unique perspective on the ways in which consumer culture and differences in societal power negatively affect the health of impacted communities. By tapping into our own spiritual wells and joining the spiritual movement for climate justice, we can help to bridge the knowledge and lived experience of these communities with the moral clarity of our faith traditions – thereby more effectively helping to ensure that policies and systems prioritize the health of people and ecosystems, rather than business interests.

By examining our own tradition’s religious teachings on the environment and engaging in dialogue with congregations about our role in causing harm to – or protecting the integrity of – creation, we are lending our voices to the environmental justice movement. We are moving ourselves and others into a new consciousness about how to live in unity and harmony with the earth and one another.

Some of the ways Catholic congregations and other faith communities are doing this include conducting energy audits of houses of worship, converting to clean energy where possible, starting compost and garden projects, divesting from fossil fuels, and advocating for better U.S. climate policy. The Franciscan Action Network, where I serve on the Board of Directors, is leading an interfaith coalition working to get money out of politics and calling out members of Congress who have been supportive of the Koch brothers’ “No Climate Tax” pledge through a #KochvsPope campaign, among other actions.

Above all, we are promoting the concept of simple living, which allows us to practice a life of ongoing conversion and provides lifelong opportunities to live in right relationship with our world. Catholics in the Franciscan tradition embrace an ecology that keeps humans and all of creation out of harm’s way. It allows us to see the “thisness” – the unique specialness of each particular living and nonliving thing – that is characteristic of Franciscan spirituality.

Written for WE ACT for Environmental Justice, http://www.weact.org/member-blog-kelly-moltzen 

A Theology of Liberation and the New Creation

The concept of a biblical approach to addressing poverty has always challenged me, especially since learning of St. Francis of Assisi’s commitment to voluntary poverty when I was a teenager.  What should be my role, as a person of privilege, in helping to bring justice and equity to the poor?  Several years ago, inspired by Francis of Assisi and the modern day Shane Claiborne, I could think of no better way to figure this out than by moving to the Bronx and living in community with others wanting to figure this out too. 

Shortly after moving to the Bronx, my roommates and I were blessed with the opportunity to get to know two people who moved into the apartment above us whose life and work was steeped in the practice and culture of liberation theology.  I was intrigued by the many stories they told of oppressed peoples in Central and South America, and even here in the United States, rising up and confronting the established powers with the power of the Gospel.  The power of the Gospel in the hands of the poor and oppressed seemed like something St. Francis of Assisi would have rejoiced at seeing.

While I do not profess to be an expert in liberation theology or the history of the Latin American church, I have learned from Joseph Nangle OFM in his book Engaged Spirituality that the liberation theology movement led to a decision made at the 1968 Catholic Bishops’ Conference in Medellín, Colombia, to prioritize the poor over the privileges of the established order. The impact of this decision by the church hierarchy was not inconsequential: more and more people sought to join this movement which was improving the authenticity of the church, now that the church was authentically serving the New Creation. And over the next ten years, a thousand people were killed for working to implement this vision, by those who preferred the status quo – continuing the Christian tradition initiated by Jesus of the faithful being persecuted by empire. 

This is the backdrop of where our current pope, Francis, was formed and lived out his early years.  The Latin American church, Pope Francis, and all they represent show us what it means to live out what Fr. Joe Nangle calls an “engaged spirituality” – a spirituality that impacts how we live every aspect of our lives.  Living a life of voluntary poverty, a counter-cultural lifestyle that prefers simplicity to consumerism, is a direct threat to the empire of capitalism that permeates society.  Following Jesus’ call to leave everything behind and follow him, the way Francis of Assisi did, leads us more fully into our faith and begs us to develop a deeper spirituality whereby we can live a richer, fuller life.  Living out an engaged spirituality allows us to recognize our interdependence with one another and all of God’s creation, and feel a sense of reverence and wonder about it all.

It is from this perspective we can best appreciate what Pope Francis has to share with us in his encyclical Laudato Si’.   Pope Francis lays out the framework for an integral ecology – one in which we recognize the responsibility we have as human beings to humbly come to terms with our place in the world.  Building on the spirituality and mysticism of St. Francis of Assisi that is so clearly expressed in St. Francis’ Canticle of the Creatures, Pope Francis continues on to “read the signs of the times” (Mt 16:3) and lays out what St. Francis would say “is ours to do” in this day and age, in order for us to rise to a new consciousness and accept the responsibility God gave us when he gave us the gift of life on Earth.

When God became incarnate through Jesus, He did so to show us how to live as a human being on Earth in such a way that would allow us to honor our Creator.  Through Jesus and the many parables He gives us throughout the Gospel, we learn how to prioritize the needs of the poor and marginalized, not take more than we need, and counter the empire that leads to suffering and injustice.  What Pope Francis is doing now is building off of the lessons of Jesus, Francis of Assisi, and many others from recent church history who are also working towards the “New Creation.”

This “New Creation” is what is referred to in the Lord’s Prayer, Isaiah 65, Revelation 21, and in many other places throughout the Bible and religious liturgy.  It is the Kingdom of God that Jesus spoke of so often and invited us to join him in building.  We are invited to be co-creators with God, which maybe is another way of interpreting the call St. Francis heard to repair God’s house, when he prayed in front of the cross of San Damiano. What greater honor do we have than the opportunity to accept this supreme invitation? 

To build the New Creation, we will need to take a sincere look at the institutionalized racism, economic inequity and environmental injustices surrounding us, and examine our contributions to the injustices and desecration of the ecological web of life.  We as humans have pushed our ecosystems beyond that which is sustainable, and it is we humans (especially the most vulnerable, who are least responsible for the desecration) – as well as other creatures – which are suffering the consequences of veering too far away from God’s original plan for humankind.  I am of the belief, much like Pope Francis, that the only hope for humanity may lie in the humility and spirituality delineated by the life of St. Francis of Assisi and the posture towards creation he shows in his Canticle of the Creatures.