St. Kateri Tekakwitha, We Give Thanks for You

We all know that Thanksgiving is a time when Americans recognize the importance of expressing gratitude for the abundance which the Earth provides us with, and for the family and friends with whom we share it. Thanksgiving commemorates the hospitality offered by Native Americans to the European Puritan colonists, as winter was setting in and the colonists were unprepared for the cold months ahead. The Native Americans provided food and support. However, the history of Thanksgiving is much more complex than that, and also involves violence, conflict, and massacres. It was actually not celebrated as a national holiday until the midst of the Civil War, when Abraham Lincoln declared it a holiday and a time for families to re-unite. This history is important to think about as present-day armed security forces inflict horrendous abuses to Native Americans at Standing Rock in North Dakota and those who are standing in solidarity with them as they protect their land and water from exploitation.  Which is why this year especially, I have felt conflicted about this holiday, a sentiment I believe is shared by many people across the country.

We cannot stand idly by and pretend like Thanksgiving can be the same as it has been celebrated for generations. The situation at Standing Rock brings to the forefront a history of centuries of exploitation, trauma and broken promises experienced by Native Americans.  Not to mention the insult to injury added to non-whites overall, through the terrible racism which has surfaced with the 2016 election. The United States has always been a place of violence and abuse of Native peoples, and of other people of color, even as it sees itself as a beacon of freedom for all. How can we now hold up that beacon, even as the armed forces inflict violence against our own people? 

Over the past few years, I’ve come to learn about the roots of much of this violence, by learning about the Doctrine of Discovery, the 1493 papal document which allowed explorers to lay claim to any land they “discovered” that was not owned by Christians.  This doctrine, which has not yet been officially renounced by the Vatican, still governs U.S. Indian law today, still being cited into the 21st century.  I really do wonder how likely it is we will begin to see Native Americans and their land treated with the respect they deserve until this document is rescinded and removed from U.S. law.

Meanwhile, over the past year and a half, Catholics and non-Catholics alike have had the opportunity to read and discuss Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si.  This modern document, which discusses at length the dual “cry of the earth and cry of the poor,” calls us to dialogue and action on behalf of all of God’s creation. Through dialogue, we can identify actions that help us carry out the work to which our spirituality calls us. 

It was through such a dialogue that I came together with several followers of Pope Francis to plan a potluck meal this week in honor of St. Kateri Tekakwitha, the first Native American recognized as a saint by the Catholic Church.  Through a network of kind-hearted faith-rooted social justice advocates I know in NYC, several of us, especially Sara Jolena Wolcott from Union Theological Seminary, Tom Dobbins from the Catholic Charities office of the Archdiocese of NY, and Terry Michaud from the Blessed Sacrament Social Action Committee and the Metro NY Catholic Climate Movement, and myself, came together to organize a dinner and discussion around the topic of indigenous peoples, and food, water, and climate justice, in honor of St. Kateri.

Held in the dining room of the Blessed Sacrament rectory, the dinner was attended by members of Blessed Sacrament’s Social Action Committee and RCIA program, members of the Metro NY Catholic Climate Movement, Tom Dobbins, Sr. Odile Courier from Holy Name Parish and Franciscans International, and several others. After prayers, we went around our circle of about sixteen people sharing what brought us into the room. People asked rich questions around food, climate, spirituality, faith, and history of the church. We started off with everyone sharing what brought them to the room. Responses were rich, and varied across the topics of food, climate, spirituality, faith, and history of the Church.  Some were concerned about food waste, portion sizes being so big, how food is valued so much less now than it used to be, why is food a privilege, and why are food dyes and other toxic chemicals fed to kids in the form of junk food. Others discussed the poor state of recycling, and how overproduction stems from a fear of not having enough. Sara reminded us that wastelands used to be referred to as “the commons,” a far cry from what most wastelands look like today. Some wanted to learn more about St. Kateri and contemplate how we can better “welcome the stranger.”

There is a thirst to learn what will wake up the planet in regards to climate change, to reconnect with creation, and to learn, what is the liturgy to support sustainability in the Catholic Church?  One woman who grew up in the Bronx reminded us that “life grows through burned buildings and cracks in the concrete,” and that, “life has to have its day.”  Sr. Odile shared how working with the indigenous people in the Philippines taught her about what it means to be close to nature/creation, and how we are so disconnected from it. A French citizen, Sr. Odile reminded us to keep our ethnocentrism in check: the U.S. is important but other countries' backgrounds are important too and we need to act together. Someone mentioned that we need to have the moral courage to talk about economics; the financial bottom line not always being the most important factor to take into consideration when making decisions.

Given the current U.S. political situation, there was a comment about the history of Church opposition to the Third Reich. An interesting comment was also made about the harm the church has done by perpetuating a false split between spirit and matter, to which I responded by saying this false split is debunked through recognizing the divine nature in all of creation including the food we eat, and the importance of food and faith in bringing us around the table together (one of the core tenants around which Christianity was founded). I also shared my discovery of the amazing parallels between Native American prayers and the Canticle of the Creatures by St. Francis of Assisi in praising creation, as I believe now more than ever, it is critical for us to recognize the parallels between Catholic and Christian spirituality and indigenous spirituality.

Sara Jolena then gave us a history lesson through retelling the story of where we are today in a way that tied together the fifteenth century Church, the Doctrine of Discovery, colonization, the Transatlantic Slave Trade, and St. Kateri. The essence of the story is as follows: through a papal bull, in 1451 Pope Nicholas V gave permission to King Alfonso V of Portugal not only to explore but also to enslave the peoples of the West Coast of Africa who were assumed to be non-Christian "pagans," or "Saracens," or Muslims. This enslavement would become the Transatlantic Slave Trade. A 1454 Papal Bull gave the Church authority to the witch hunts, destroying the lower-class "indigenous women of Europe."  In 1493, when Columbus returned from the "New World," Pope Alexander VI wrote several other bulls that encouraged conquest of any land not inhabited by Christians. This became known as the Doctrine of Discovery. It supported Spain’s conquest of the New World, starting with the lands “discovered” by Columbus. The Doctrine of Discovery had at its premise that “the Catholic faith and the Christian religion be exalted and be everywhere increased and spread, that the health of souls be cared for and that barbarous nations be overthrown and brought to the faith itself.”1  [The tragedy, which was made painfully clear to me during a recent talk by a Colombian visitor to the Union Theological Seminary Center for Earth Ethics, is that indigenous peoples did not quite need to be “converted” to Christianity, especially through violent conquest which is against the core tenant of Christianity. The Natives already possessed a respect for the divine nature of creation and did not need to hear Jesus’ message as much as the people to whom Jesus preached and ministered to in his corner of the world.]

St. Kateri, meanwhile, was a Native American who converted to Catholicism and practiced a devout religious life. She chose the name "Kateri," the Mohawk form of Catherine, taking the namesake of Catherine of Siena.  Her short life was marked by illness, loss, sorrow and suffering as she witnessed her family suffer and become turned upside down in the contact with the Europeans, who brought disease, a monetary-based economy hungry to consume the natural resources of this land, and a faith that stirred her heart. despite her family's protests, she refused to marry anyone except Jesus Christ. She lived between two worlds: Catholic and Mohawk. So far as we know, she treasured both. Eventually she moved to a monastery in New France where she and another Native woman yearned to start their own nunnery; they were told that they were too young. She died at age 24 surrounded by her new-found community. According to the priests who sat besides her as she was dying, after her death, the scars from the small pox that had marked her face since she was suffered from the disease brought by the Europeans at age three vanished and her face began to brightly glow. It was one of many miracles associated with her.

Given this history and the current state of affairs with Native Americans, I find myself asking, what would St. Francis of Assisi do?  The Doctrine of Discovery didn’t come into existence until a few hundred years after Francis’ death. But he gave us the Canticle of the Creatures, which is of the same thread of understanding of our place within the ecological web of life as the beliefs held by indigenous peoples. He also gave us a lifetime’s worth of inspiring actions that he took in response to the simple command he heard through prayer to “repair the house” of God.  In the same way that Francis’ life and spirituality has been a source of inspiration for Franciscans for centuries, St. Kateri’s ability to bridge indigenous culture and Catholic tradition should be a source of inspiration for us all as well.  So, in the wake of human rights atrocities and what Pope Francis refers to in Laudato Si as “unbridled exploitation” happening at Standing Rock, may we remember that Water is Life, and do all that is in our power to protect it for one another and for generations to come.

1 http://www.nativeweb.org/pages/legal/indig-inter-caetera.html

*Updated to include edits from Sara Jolena Wolcott 

You may also find this resource useful:  How to Give, and to Give Thanks, to Standing Rock  

New Heaven, New Earth: Musings on Permaculture & Integral Ecology

There has been oppression, corruption and war for millennia – this, we know, is not something new.  Jesus and other prophets have actively taught means of interacting within corrupt systems to bring about Heaven on Earth.  Many of these people, Jesus included, did their ministry and prayer work in natural environments, and told parables that led people to contemplate the natural world. Coming to these realizations throughout my lifetime, I immediately recognized myself in the story of permaculture expert Bill Mollison, as told by Fred Bahnson in Soil and Sacrament:   

Mollison had grown up in a small village in Tasmania, and became horrified as he saw fish stocks collapsing and large sections of forest disappear. He began to protest against the political and industrial systems that were to blame. ‘But,’ he wrote in Introduction to Permaculture, ‘I soon decided that it was no good persisting with opposition that in the end achieved nothing.’ For the next two years Mollison withdrew from society. When he returned he realized he did not want to oppose anything ever again and waste his time. He wanted to come back only with something positive, ‘Something that would allow us all to exist without the wholesale collapse of biological systems.’ What Mollison came back with was the beginnings of permaculture, a ‘whole human system.’

I likewise decided early on to focus on building a holistic system. Thus, my career has focused on nutrition, public health, and promoting sustainable food systems whenever possible.  What I’ve realized since the 2015 release of Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si is that these ideas about permaculture are very much in line with the concept of integral ecology.

We can use systems thinking to create an integrative food system where food grown is connected with healthcare and mental health systems and a more sustainable environment. We can put the systems in place to put Laudato Si into action. To do this, we will need to educate, but we will also need to organize and advocate.  While Bill Mollison may have chosen not to oppose anything and Jesus did much of his ministry in the fields, we must also remember that Jesus also flipped over the money tables in the temple.  It’s clear in the Bible that man cannot serve God and mammon, and that we shouldn’t worship the golden calf. Yet, that is what so many corporations are doing now.

According to Citizens United, corporations are people – but of course, we know that’s not true. We know the people making up the corporations are people, not the corporations themselves.  We also know it is not good to wish ill on the people making up the corporations. It is good for them to have livable wages to support themselves and their families, healthcare, and meaningful work.  To make sure everyone has a fair chance for these necessary components of healthy living, the people who are most enmeshed in corporate greed – amassing gross wealth off the backs of the working poor – need to back off a good deal from their possessions and materialism, and open up to more of a communal, humane way of interacting with the marginalized.

With decent financial and human investment, we can create more green jobs, include people affected by injustices in the decisionmaking processes, and capture carbon back into the Earth to mitigate and prevent catastrophic climate change. This is just as true in the Bronx as it is in Harlem, as it is in the bayous of Louisiana, as it is in Haiti, and every other place affected by environmental injustices.

In Soil and Sacrament, Fred Bahnson also quotes Rainer Maria Rilke:

All will come again into its strength:

the fields undivided, the waters undammed,

the trees towering and the walls built low.

And in the valleys, people as strong

and as varied as the land.

What a vision of shalom! When I read this I thought first of bringing shalom to Haiti, where the water has been dammed up leading to much dry, barren land, exacerbated by deforestation due to the burning of wood for cooking fires.  It reminded me of the holistic vision for restoration of this island nation that I’ve begun brainstorming with several others over the past few months. But this prophetic poetic excerpt can apply to anywhere we wish to restore with shalom - God’s holistic peace.

So, how can we begin sharing the stories of people creating a “new heaven and a new earth” and living out Laudato Si?  When will we begin to create a truly holistic system of integral ecology and shalom?

¹Then I saw “a new heaven and a new earth,” for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea. ² I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. ³ And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, “Look! God’s dwelling place is now among the people, and he will dwell with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. ⁴ ‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.” – Revelations 21: 1-4

“So That They May Be One”: John 17 and Catholic-Protestant Dialogue

Yesterday, I stepped foot into the Bahá’í House of Worship for North America on the outskirts of Chicago with my good friend from high school, who happens to be Jewish.  The Baha’i faith is one that is inclusive of all religions – actually, the Bahá’ís believe “the religions of the world come from the same Source and are in essence successive chapters of one religion from God.” After my experiences with religious unity with GreenFaith, it felt so good to be able to return to this feeling of oneness, this feeling that I did not need to feel separated from my brothers and sisters of other religions and other denominations, despite the world’s great attempts to keep us all divided.  Growing up in the public school system, I have always had friends of other religions and denominations, and the divide between us because of my connection to the Catholic Church has always saddened me.  So, it felt good yesterday to be able to share in worship with someone who, other than babysitting kids at her temple during Jewish holiday services as a teenager, I had not previously shared a religious experience with.  

As a teenager, I was very active in a Franciscan ministry program for youth called Capuchin Youth & Family Ministries. The Franciscan charism then left me thirsting for more than I was able to get from the Catholic church on my college campus, and I began exploring the non-denominational, ecumenical, and Protestant angles of Christianity, where I felt a unity and inclusiveness that reminded me of the Franciscan charism I had previously experienced.  Since then I have felt I bridged a divide between the Catholic Church and non-Catholic Christians.  I also had a spiritual awakening during this time that “we are all one.” 

“Holy Father, keep them in your name that you have given me, so that they may be one just as we are” is a line from a verse in John 17.  This verse, as it happens, has also inspired others within the Christian tradition to come together in unity across denominations.  The John 17 Movement seeks to bridge the divide between Catholics and Protestants, and even includes a moving message from Pope Francis about unity:

Pope Francis message to John 17 Movement on May 23rd, 2015 in Phoenix, AZ from John 17 Movement on Vimeo.

I am deeply inspired by this movement for unity, and as a board member of the Franciscan Action Network, which represents all branches of the family of followers of St. Francis of Assisi – Catholic, Episcopal, Lutheran, and Ecumenical – I am committed to learning what more we can do to bring unity to Christians everywhere. We share a common heritage, one of following the teachings of Jesus of Nazareth.  Now in this moment in history, when the world has been turned upside down by Pope Francis, may we ask ourselves, “What Would Jesus Do?”.

May we return to the prayer of Jesus in John 17, and learn to seek unity between the gaps that divide us.  

David Choquehuanca, Foreign Minister of Bolivia and "Bien Vivir"

I had the honor of introducing David Choquehuanca, Foreign Minister of Bolivia, at William Camacaro's May 12th Alberto Lovera Bolivarian Circle event about "Bien Vivir," or "Living Well."  This is an indigenous concept of humanity living in harmony with nature that is so simple it may seem radical (which actually shouldn't surprise anyone, as the word radical means "to the root"). 

David's comments about Bien Vivir, Bolivian culture, and its earth-honoring traditions echoed Pope Francis' encyclical Laudato Si in profound ways. He spoke of a "crisis of values, morals and world outlook," the need for us to be integral human beings, living in alignment with Mother Nature / Mother Earth, the need for a focus on equality, the concept that we all belong to one big family, and the similarities and distinctions amongst humans and between humans and other aspects of nature. He spoke of many indigenous terms and concepts that show us the deep wisdom our world has fallen away from, such as the symbolism in the Bolivian flag that we must learn to nourish ourselves and seek nutritional sovereignty, not just learn how to eat.  Bien Vivir is possible for those committed to self determination, dialogue, and resisting capitalism but transcending socialism, to a new way of pushing forward to decolonization in order to support all of life.  This concept is best captured in the Quechua-Aymara term "Jallalla," which Pope Francis greeted crowds with when he visited Bolivia in 2015. The more we compare this indigenous wisdom with the recently unearthed spirituality of the Church that Pope Francis has unearthed and shared in Laudato Si, the more I believe we will see just how similar these worldviews are.

As we know, Pope Francis took his name from St. Francis of Assisi. St. Francis exuded and lived out a spirituality that displayed his kinship with all of creation - a worldview that is actually quite similar to the indigenous worldview David Choquehuanca spoke about. I find great value and importance in working to bring this spirituality back to a Church that needs our support to instill the teachings of Pope Francis in a meaningful way.

I am therefore grateful to be part of organizing a Laudato Si workshop series with the West Side Deanery, which includes Catholic Churches along the West Side of Manhattan in the Archdiocese of NY.  The next workshop, the second of a two-part focus on Chapter 5: Lines of Approach and Action, will be held on Tuesday, May 17 at 7pm at St. John the Baptist Church on West 30th St between 7th and 8th Avenues (refreshments at 6:30pm). We'll be sharing about several Catholic and religious organizations working to address climate change and other social justice issues, that people can collaborate with to bring various ecological initiatives back to their home parishes or organizations.

Another opportunity to continue the conversation is by participating in Tierra Sagrada (Sacred Earth, Sacred Trust) - a global day of worldwide, multifaith prayer and action for creation on June 12.  Organized by people of faith from Latin America, this day will mark six months after the Paris Climate Agreement, join the celebration of International Environment Day (June 5) and the first anniversary of the publication of Pope Francis' encyclical Laudato Si (June 18). While 175 countries have already signed the Paris Climate Agreement, "we are set for temperature rises well above the critical 1.5°C limit that governments agreed to, and that scientists, activists, and vulnerable communities are fighting for with the cry of '1.5°C to Stay Alive'." It seems we still have a long way to go to realize the vision of Bien Vivir that David Choquehuanca speaks about so eloquently. 

 

New York for Bernie, 2016

There are some times when we need to become our own media. One of those times is now.
The Bronx, the United States, and the World need Bernie. And right now, Bernie needs New York.
New York, let's show the world that New York City is not the center of the universe because of Wall Street, but because of its humanity.

Last week, I had the opportunity to attend Congressman Bernie Sanders' presidential rally at St. Mary's Park in Mott Haven, the section of the South Bronx where I have lived for the past five years.  The rally was a huge success and drew between 18,500-20,000 people - people of all backgrounds - the working class. And today, Bernie came to a second rally in the Bronx, this time at Bronx Community College - another success. The library auditorium was filled with college students and others - real Bronxites and other New Yorkers - listening to this Vermont Senator from Brooklyn who gives us hope.

I was grateful to hear New York State Assemblyman Luis Sepulveda standing up for Bernie at both rallies. Sepulveda says he did not endorse Bernie from the beginning, but wanted to look at the issues first. Once he did, he realized there was no other candidate he could stand with other than Bernie Sanders.  This is line with previous meetings I have been in with Assemblyman Sepulveda, where I distinctly remember leaving feeling impressed with how principled he was.

Some major news outlets have been starting to pay attention, giving more airwaves to Bernie Sanders and the issues that he is talking about, rather than the rhetoric and contradictions being spewed by other candidates. Yet there are still a lot of doubtful people, and people who say Hillary is going to win New York, she has all the superdelegates. Well, that's precisely the establishment we are working to deconstruct, that Bernie has been talking about.  He walks the walk in his opposition to money in politics, the need to repeal Citizens United, and the need for campaign finance reform. That is the first step to a true democracy. He has been consistent on his messages about the need to hold the banks of Wall Street accountable, invest in living wages ($15/hr) for working class people rather than war, make college education affordable, have a healthcare system for all, accept the human-induced causes of climate change and take responsibility for addressing them, bar for-profit prisons, and address the plight of urban communities across the country.  Political actions that demonstrate that he upholds the human dignity of all, especially the most disenfranchised.

Bernie spoke eloquently about religious coexistence - what matters is not if a person is Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Jewish, Buddhist, or other - but that there is love.  My good friend Jonathan Reid shared a video on my Facebook page the other day of someone giving out Free Hugs at a Bernie Rally and a Trump Rally.  It goes without saying, there was a lot more love at the Bernie rally.

Man offers free hugs at Sanders and Trump rallies and gets shockingly different responses Free Hugs Project
Posted by Salon on Thursday, March 31, 2016

Actually, Bernie has received an invitation to speak at the Vatican next week.  Though, he is not the first progressive socialist Jew to be invited to the Vatican; last year, the Vatican invited Naomi Klein, author of This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate.

A friend of mine made a flyer comparing Bernie Sanders' statements on climate change, war, and economic inequality to those of Pope Francis, even before the announcement was made about the Vatican's invitation.  It is really not hard to figure out why someone like Bernie Sanders would appeal to the Vatican.  He speaks up about addressing wealth inequality and other injustices that keep people oppressed - issues that fit squarely within the realm of Catholic Social Teaching. His spiritual convictions - that we are all in this together - are also very much in line with the church's teachings.

Besides the superdelegates, the other significant concern regarding the primaries is all of the support the unions are throwing at Hillary Clinton.  Bernie supports unions too - why wouldn't he?  He's for the working class.  The Working Families Party has already enthusiastically endorsed Bernie Sanders, though unfortunately the votes don't count in the primaries.  But the unions are endorsing Hillary.  What's even sadder is they are unethically using staff time to support Hillary. A friend of mine who works for a union told me they were going to make him go canvas for Hillary.  I told him to just talk about the issues.

Through Bronx Health REACH, I am working with the United Federation of Teachers to bring nutrition education into schools in the Bronx. The UFT is a big help in this regard, certainly they play an important role in society. But one role they should not play is endorsing candidates, especially if those wishes go against their employees.  That role is what the Working Families Party is for.

I had a wonderful time at the Bernie rally today. I met real New Yorkers, with incredible stories to tell.  I stood online next to a retiree currently serving on a Bronx community board who said of his career working on Wall Street: "If you want to see cocaine, go to Wall Street."  He had become addicted to drugs working on Wall Street, not from living the Bronx.  I also had a fascinating conversation with the guy sitting next to me during the rally, an actor named James McDaniel, who lives in Harlem, saw the gentrification that happened around the time Bill Clinton moved his office to the Harlem State Office Building, and has been invited to dinners at the White House on numerous occasions.  He told me the one time he got to speak to President Obama, he said, "This country doesn't deserve you."  I would have to agree with him. It made me sad, actually, to hear Bernie today saying the same thing Obama said during his candidacy, that he needs the American people to work with him.  Because the thing is, Obama and Sanders are telling the truth.  Things will not change unless we the people are working together with progressive elected officials to create the change we want to see. 

This election, the primaries are an opportunity for Americans to vote with their values. The Democratic ticket can go to Bernie or Hillary. It is not about who will beat who later on. We are talking about now.  Now is our opportunity to create a revolution, as Tracy Chapman's voice sang out through the loudspeaker at the end of the Bernie rally.

The choice is ours.  Will we stand up for our values?  We have until April 19th to decide. This is our opportunity to embrace hope and our spiritual convictions and build a world we can be proud of. I hope we will choose it. And for those who are still skeptics, may I ask that you seek to really listen to a few Bernie supporters. They probably have some pretty incredible stories to tell.

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 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.

Trade Deals Hit Poor Hard

There’s something about lived experience that is so much more useful than what we can learn through reading textbooks, news articles, or other third party sources of information. Life teaches us things that become imprinted on our beings in ways that cannot be undone by hearing critiques from those with their own uncompromising agendas. For me, a public health nutritionist, international trade deals were not something that I normally would have paid much attention to had I not met people who were able to show me the connections between the trade deals negotiated behind closed doors and the tremendous disenfranchisement and poor health of people living in poverty, both in the Bronx and across the world.

It was through hearing stories of Mexican peasants forced off their farms and into poverty and economic migration across the US-Mexico border, for example, that I understood the legacy of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Given the impacts that past trade agreements such as NAFTA have had on those experiencing involuntary poverty, we must look critically at the trans-national agreements currently being negotiated: the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP), the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) and the Trade In Services Agreement (TISA).

Free trade, at first glance, sounds like a good idea. It seems like an opportunity to provide an expanded market for entrepreneurs wishing to engage in an exchange with others who may be outside of their regular circles of customers. But as I have learned from trade justice activists, when global corporate powers set the agenda, they do so at the expense of the working poor, small businesses, health, environmental sustain-ability, and even democracy. The negotiations which led to the establishment of the World Trade Organization (WTO) included advisors from many industry trade groups, while non-governmental organizations representing human rights, labor, the environment, and other social justice causes were barely given a voice at the table. Due to this imbalance, there is an inherent structural lack of democracy within the WTO, whereby, because decisions are made by consensus, powerful countries are able to dominate trade policy and put pressure on smaller and poorer countries to accept larger countries’ agendas, allowing for corporate-managed trade at the expense of social, environmental and developmental interests. According to a Discussion Course on Globalization and its Critics published by the Northwest Earth Institute, WTO rules allow countries to challenge non-tariff barriers which can include “policies put in place for health and safety, environmental, and human rights concerns.”

 It should not come as any surprise that despite public resistance in dozens of countries, trade negotiators have developed new trade agreements outside the WTO. These new agreements advance corporate interests to an even more extreme degree than WTO negotiations allowed. Further, the new agreements being negotiated unfortunately have again not taken into account the voices of the public and developing countries. Instead of building on the concept of democratic participation of membership in the WTO and negotiating more regional trade deals which would give more economic opportunities to developing countries, as former director-general of the WTO, Supachai Panitchpakdi, from Thailand has pointed out, the agreements on the table are predominately US and European centric trade deals. These deals would benefit the big corporations at the expense of the small companies, health, the environment, and the human rights of those in the lower and middle classes. The deals weaken labor and environmental standards employed in production processes and lead to more jobs being shipped overseas as companies seek to find the cheapest possible labor.

Exploiting their inside track to the negotiations, the corporations have influenced the development of new trade agreements which would give them even more global power than they were given through the WTO. For example, TPP and TTIP would expand the number of corporations who would qualify for investor state dispute status, the ability of international corporations to sue sovereign states for regulations that infringe upon their profits or expected future profits. This could mean natural gas companies suing the New York State government for the profits they may have generated had it not been for the recent state-wide ban on hydraulic fracturing. Further, twenty-four of the twenty-nine chapters of the TPP text do not even relate to trade, but instead include sections on food standards, labor, environment, and intellectual property, for example. The intellectual property chapter includes provisions for companies to extend their intellectual property and patenting abilities, such as over seeds and other agricultural inputs, as well as pharmaceuticals. In the case of pharmaceutical patents, this would mean increased prices of medicines and health care, which will strain public health systems and leave the most vulnerable unable to afford important medications.

TPP proponents claim that the agreement would create new jobs in the US. However, critics of the deal have found that the very study from the Peterson Institute of International Economics that is cited to show that 650,000 new jobs would be created in the US also predicts that the TPP would actually create zero additional jobs. Further, according to the Center for Economic and Policy Research, any projected gains for US workers would be wiped out by inequality that the TPP would produce. All of the job creation and promises being touted by the TPP advocates can be summed up in these words from Mark Twain: “There are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics.” I have found, particularly among labor unions, that there is a great concern that the TPP would encourage companies to outsource manufacturing jobs to countries where workers could be paid lower wages—undoubtedly at the expense of labor standards and human rights as well. In the Bronx, developers would be incentivized to tear down current apartment buildings and ship in materials—produced without regard to the workers or the environment—to build new housing developments, displacing some 7,000 families from their homes. Meanwhile, as trade negotiators and corporations support the outsourcing of jobs, there are efforts to localize production. Perhaps out of a necessity for their own sovereignty, community residents have started to come together to create cooperative development initiatives that provide workers with living wages as well as dignity and empowerment. But again, because of the restrictions on government procurement contracts, the TPP and TTIP would push local businesses—including construction businesses—out, in favor of what can be found within the global corporate marketplace.

While the negotiating texts of the TPP have been kept secret from the public and access is limited even for members of US Congress, President Obama asked for and received fast track authority from Congress, after a huge fight from the advocacy community.  Congress has thereby effectively surrendered its constitutional authority to shape trade agreements, and prevented the public from having a say in the negotiations. Our government may have decided that corporations are people, but in the eyes of our Creator, corporations will never be people. Not unlike, St. Francis of Assisi, who gave up a wealthy inheritance to live alongside the poor and care for all of creation, we need to call out the financial motives behind these trade deals, and stand up against the destructive effects they are having on our families and communities. The most important thing we can do right now is raise awareness about the dangers of the TPP and let our Congressional representatives hear our concerns about these trade agreements. We cannot allow corporations to ruin our environment and our health. The people who run these corporations are disconnected from the reality that we are interdependent with the land; their decisions are going to hurt all of us, especially the most vulnerable.

While fast track has already passed, opposition to the trade treaties is growing, so much so that it may be possible to still prevent the treaties from passage. May we gain strength from Pope Francis and his call to the whole world in his encyclical, Laudato Si’, to call out our government’s support of policies and treaties which make the rich richer and the poor poorer.