Ayana Elizabeth Johnson on the Importance of Community

 

Climate Scientist 
Ayana Elizabeth Johnson

(Image by Gilberto Tadday / TED )

Climate Scientist and Marine Biologist Ayana Elizabeth Johnson (editor of the excellent collection of essays "All We Can Save") is publishing a new work, What if We Get it Right?  In a NY Times podcast, dated May 18, 2024, she discussed her concerns as well as her optimism.  What are motivations for us with regard to addressing climate change, and what are the obstacles to motivation?  She believes it boils down to community and a sense of responsibility that arises from that. I was struck by the following quote  (bold is my emphasis, of course):  

We all want to hold onto our comforts. I think the answer is community.  We have to be responsible to more than ourselves.  We have to feel an obligation to more than just our children. It can’t just be a selfish desire to hold on to what we currently have, which is - even that is illogical because the world is going to change around us and, the things we have, we won’t be able to hold onto - because we can’t actually control all of society and live in a bubble. And so, you can maybe hold really tightly onto your comforts in the short term, but the more we resist being part of a collective solution, the less likely that collective solution is to happen. 

I mean, in a sense, we’re echoing a bit of this bunker mentality where we have these wealthy people buying up land in New Zealand and wherever else, trying to just save themselves.  And to me that seems like such a sad way to see the world., right?  Like, do you want to live in a bunker for a year eating canned rations?  Like, is that the life we want to build, or do we just all try to make sure we have a world where there’s enough for everybody and no one takes too much, and we share what we have?  I’d rather share.

Obviously, if I blogged about it, I think it's worth a listen.  I've linked using my "gift" of 8 articles per month, so hopefully it's not behind a paywall. 

Marchese, D. (2024, May 18). This Scientist Has an Antidote to Our Climate Delusions. The New York Times. https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/18/magazine/ayana-elizabeth-johnson-interview.html

Pandemic as Opportunity?

The pandemic is tragic.  Nothing good can be said for it.  Nevertheless, it does give pause.  Pause, in itself, creates an unusual opportunity.  

The Good Soil

Rootbound!

Gardening gives time for quiet contemplation as one engages with the Earth and God's creation.

The other day, as I was transplanting seedlings from peat pots into the ground, I noticed that even though (in theory) the roots of the seedlings were supposed to be able to push through the peat pots, in most cases they had not.  Instead, as the tiny roots reached the wall of the pot, they turned and went a different direction, back inside the pot.

A healthy plant with room to grow will stretch its roots downwards and outwards into the rich soil, supporting the leaves and growth above. When a plant repeatedly encounters the wall of a pot as its roots try to grow, the normal course of growth is interrupted. Its roots turn inward, doubling back upon themselves.  When the roots of the plant are tangled and curled back upon themselves inside a pot, eventually there it's not enough soil to nourish the plant. Eventually, the crowded roots become a tangled mass that is so dense it can't even absorb water. Because the plant is limited by the confines of the pot, it will have to be watered constantly. Due to lack of nourishment, the plant will always be stressed, and its growth will be stunted. In short, the plant will never reach its full potential.


When the gardener moves a seedling from a small pot to a bigger one or from a seed tray into the garden, the gardener will gently spread the roots so that the young transplant can grow in a healthy way.

In my own life, I find this to be true, as well. When I've been sitting in a comfortable spot in life, I don't always enjoy being pushed out of my comfortable space. Sometimes, however, being pushed out of my comfortable space is what's needed for growth. Sometimes, it may even be necessary for the gardener in my life to untangle my roots in order to allow them to spread out. I'll try to remember this next time I'm uncomfortable with disruption in my life.

Three Personal Benefits to Me of Growing a Kitchen Garden

In two previous blog posts I have discussed practical benefits of kitchen gardens (cost, health, and taste) and collective benefits (environmental, sustainability, and building community). Today, I would like to discuss six more personal, intangible factors that keep me returning to my habit of kitchen gardening.

Slower Pace

I have a "day job" that can be fast paced and stressful. Committing a half hour per day to gardening helps me carve out personal space, engage in an activity very different from my other vocation, and restore a work life balance.  

Introspection Time

 For me personally, gardening time is quiet time. It is a long moment of silence. It is a time to look at some item in detail, whether it is weeds or bugs or dirt or new plants. It involves focusing attention on something that is not related to work or stress or other things in life. It allows for creative interruption and regrouping of ideas in a way that benefits the way I think in other areas of life.

Connectedness With Land

Watching a garden grow, on a daily basis, sometimes feels akin to waiting for a pot to boil. (I am alluding to the adage, "a watched pot never boils.")  Indeed, gardens grow even slower than the water boils! They take months, sometimes years, to reach maturity! Yet, grow and change they do!  Inexorably, plants grow, mature, wilt, and die. It doesn't hurt us to experience this cycle of life, change, and death, on a different pace than what we see in our daily, hectic, industrial lives. It is good to remember that even when things seem to be standing still, they are in fact moving forward. This leads to seasonality and connection with changing seasons, as well. Gardens remind us of seasons. They remind that seasons are real, that there are times for doing things and times for refraining.  They remind us to be patient. And they also remind us that fruit comes to those who do their part and wait. 

Self Sufficiency

There is something simply satisfying about providing food for the table. Whether it is a sprig of basil on a sandwich, parsley in a tabouli, or a curry made all from home grown vegetables, there is a satisfaction that comes from being able to say, "I grew this." 

Connectedness With Heritage

My first memory of gardening was when my mother showed me how to weed the corn seedlings that were popping up in our garden. She showed me which plants to pull up and which to leave in the ground. Then she sent me to work on my row, while she did hers. When she came back, I learned that I had pulled up all the corn seedlings and left the weeds! Fortunately, there was still time to replant, and one must admit that it was a memorable mother daughter time! Other memories of gardening involve my grandparents, my uncles, my father. All passing along their collective wisdom and a heritage that includes growing plants and living a sustainable, self-sufficient lifestyle. This is not the only connection with the past, however. My grandparents learned their farming practices from their parents, who learned from theirs, etc. When I pick up a hoe to weed, I imagine many ancestors before me who used an almost identical tool to do almost the same thing. The fact is, that I am a hobbyist whereas they were working to provide table sustenance through long winter months. Nevertheless, gardening connects me with them, with that heritage, and with the skills of self-sufficiency that they passed along to me.

Connectedness With Future

Just as my parents and grandparents passed their skills and ideas along to me, so I also want impart those to my children. I have wonderful memories of sharing the preparation of soil, planting of seeds, harvesting, cooking, and eating garden produce with my own children. As such, the heritage of my past lives on into the future, passing memory and family story to the next generation. Gardening facilitates the sharing of values and things that I value with those whom I particularly value.

AN INVITATION TO WILDERNESS

“Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, left the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into the wilderness ….” (Luke 4:1)

The forty days of Lent represents the time Jesus spent in the wilderness, enduring the temptation of Satan and preparing to begin his ministry. Lent invites us to enter into and explore the landscape of our own, spiritual wilderness. In this blog post, I would like to invite the reader to explore with me some ideas about what such a journey might look like, feel like, what tools we need before venturing into our own “wilderness,” and benefits of such a journey. (Note: a shortened version of this blog post appears HERE .)



(Christ in the Wilderness, Ivan Nikolaevich Kramskoi [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons)

How Should I Live?

"So live, that when thy summons comes to join

The innumerable caravan, which moves

To that mysterious realm, where each shall take

His chamber in the silent halls of death,

Thou go not, like the quarry-slave at night,

Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed

By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave

Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch

About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams. "

William Cullen Bryant

Reshaping Our Dreams

Sometimes life takes a different turn than we expected. Our dreams, as if they were bread dough, get folded and kneaded back over on themselves, and sometimes even pounded, pulled, and stretched into a different shape than the one we had envisioned or planned for ourselves. But our re-shaped and re-made dreams can still be beautiful. To illustrate in a personal way how this can apply in an every day, ordinary life, I am linking at the bottom of this post to a blog post by Kelle Hampton. This moving story of a mother's love is a testament to the truth that beauty can come from events which totally disrupt our life narrative and turn it upside down on its head.  When Kelle learned her baby had been born with Down's Syndrome, she had to say goodbye to the baby she had expected and dreamt of, and hello to the baby she received.  In the process of doing so, she herself was transformed.

On this Fourth Sunday in Advent of 2013, it is also natural to think of the Christ Child. This little Jewish boy, born to young parents of obscure origins, seems the most unlikely of candidates for God to have chosen.   He was not what the Jews envisioned as their Messiah, at all.  Indeed!  He turned our every narrative and expectation on top of its head.  When he returned to his home town as a prophet, the people were so shocked they couldn't believe it.  After all, he was just an ordinary boy!  In Matthew 13:55 they are reported as saying, "Is this not the carpenter's son?  Is not his mother called Mary?  And his brothers James, Joses, Simon, and Judas?"  Their narrative, their view of the world, was being bent and shaped and folded in a new way.  Could they accept it?  Could they release their own preconceived expectations about who Jesus was and what he "ought" to say, in order to hear what he really had to say?

Has so much changed?  Even today, there are many people who would rather not hear what Jesus really has to say. We would so much rather remake God into our own image of what we would like to imagine, or to hear our own wishes expressed in what we hear.  It's much easier to push Jesus into our preconceived box of what we want to hear, rather than to hear his real message, isn't it?

Thus, at Christmas, I remind myself and each one of us:

Click HERE to read about a Mom's spiritual journey after learning her daughter had Down's Syndrome.
(   http://www.kellehampton.com/2010/01/nella-cordelia-birth-story.html  )

Feeling Blue?

Depression affects everyone from time to time.  

Whether you're feeling just a bit blue or struggle with a dark cloud, 

this film clip might help. 

Need help immediately? 

In the U.S., call 1-800-273-8255

Blessed Are Those Who Mourn, For They Will Be Comforted

Nowhere and at no time is grief more acute than on those holidays when we celebrate our connectedness to others: Thanksgiving, Hanukkah, Christmas, Birthdays, Anniversaries.  If you are grieving, acutely and painfully morning the loss of a precious loved one, this post is for you.  I also write for the friends of the bereaved, to help you understand a bit of what your friend may be going through.

Choose To Live. Suicide Is Just Not An Option.

In this age
when suicide is an epidemic

This post is for those who 

despair, 

who feel alone, 

who feel there is no hope.

I want to tell you,

there is hope. 

For Those Who Mourn

Tonight, I simply pray for those who mourn.  

May you find comfort and peace.  

 "The Lord is near to the brokenhearted 

and saves the crushed in spirit.  ... 

The Lord redeems the life of his servants; 

none of those who take refuge in him will be condemned."  

(from Psalm 34)

Prayer and Silence

“In the silence of the heart God speaks. 

If you face God in prayer and silence, God will speak to you. 

Then you will know that you are nothing. 

It is only when you realize your nothingness, your emptiness, 

that God can fill you with Himself. 

Souls of prayer are souls of great silence.”

Mother Teresa

8/26/10 - 9/5/97

Photo is from Huffington Post article
commemorating the date of her death by restating some of her more famous quotes,
including this one.  Article may be found at:
 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/09/05/mother-teresa-quotes-death_n_3845448.html