Enough for Everyone

Every Day is Earth Day

Every day we hear of Presbyterian churches and families around the country that are changing their light bulbs, carpooling to church and buying more local foods. These actions all reduce greenhouse gas emissions and leave a smaller footprint on God’s Creation. Each of us has a contribution to make in the effort to mitigate the effects of climate change.  

Consider deepening your involvement and celebrating every day as Earth Day. Check out our

Green Living materials as a place to get started. 

-  Engage with family, friends, your Sunday school class or other small group to share ideas, discuss and pray together.

-  Form a discussion group with interested members of your congregation or community.

-  Learn more. Alternatives for Simple Living provides recommendations for educational materials on simple, joyful and green living.

 

What are your green living practices? 

 

(Ideas provided in the Comments section below will help us expand Green Living for future use.)

Enough for Every Valentine

This Valentine's Day we have many opportunities to show our love for not only our loved ones, but our communities and all God’s people and places around the world. 

 

Ironically, on a day set aside to express love, going the traditional route with gifts may unwittingly cause suffering that we do not intend. From child labor in West African cacao fields to lead-laced fumes from Peruvian smelters, our decisions may be more far-reaching than we know. 

 

Consider the following ideas or create your own!

 

FAIR TRADE CHOCOLATE

-  The Presbyterian Coffee Project is more than fair trade coffee—it’s tea, cocoa, chocolate and snacks, too. Equal Exchange offers several types of chocolates for a variety of palates. 

-  Divine Chocolate offers great films of cacao farmers talking about the benefits of Fair Trade, as well as recipes, product descriptions and a search engine for stores in your area.

 

DINNERS

-  Use Local Harvest's Organic Restaurant Finder to find local, organic and sustainable restaurants and markets.

-  Cook at home and check out Greening Your Food & Drink. 

 

FAIR TRADE GIFTS

-  Partners for Just Trade offers fair trade crafts from Peru, educates about fair trade, and was founded with help from the Presbyterian Hunger Program. 

-  SERRV carries a wide variety of items in a range of prices that will please both your sweetie and your pocket book. 

-  From chocolate to earrings to silk ties, Global Exchange’s Fair Trade Store has something for everyone.

 

D-I-Y

The group New American Dream offers creative suggestions for Giving Freely While Spending Frugally.  

 

YOUR OWN IDEAS

What creative ideas are you planning this Valentine’s Day? What have you done in the past? 

 

We’d love to share your ideas with others. We are creating an online guide to sustainable celebrations for Valentine's Day (much like our other Just Living holiday materials). We'd love to publish your ideas. Submit ideas by commenting on this post, or emailing us. You will be given credit for your submissions.

 

Enough for EVERYONE

As my year with the Presbyterian Hunger Program progresses, I find myself thinking a lot about the many challenges we face in our Nation and the World.

The specters of hunger and disease manifest themselves in many ways. Political posturing and civil war enter the mix and a bad situation becomes hell on Earth. Zimbabwe is currently in such a mess. Hyper inflation, political corruption and micro organisms have all conspired to bring an entire country to its knees and worse. 

As a child that knew hunger, every time I see a child in the US or overseas suffering with too little my heart aches.  Looking at these pictures from the NY Times, I find it hard to understand how a President can selfishly cling to power while a people waste away.  It's hard to believe that neighboring leaders, whose citizens are beginning to suffer the same death, aren't crying out for action.  It's awful to think that the average American knows little to nothing about these atrocities and those that do are rendered speechless.

Zimbabwe has become a scene from Lamentations and we see, hear and do nothing.

Three and a half months into my internship and I'm still figuring out with what "Enough for Everyone"  means to me.  Enough for Everyone.  "Enough" is well and good.  I can handle having enough.  It keeps me in food and cloths.  "Comfortable" in a word.  It is the "Everyone" part that is hard to get my brain around.  As an American I am especially challenged by anything that even resembles socialism.  "Everyone" is big.  In the land of plenty it is easy to forget that everything we consume had to come from somewhere and was made by someone.  The challenge of "Everyone" is not mine alone, our culture has real problems with it.  In order to come to grips with the "Everyone" part, we as a people have to accept that our plenty comes at the expense of so many people in Africa.  Our plenty was extracted from what used to be mountains in Appalachia.  And our waste is being spewed on to Peruvian school yards.   

What can we do to change our ways?

The book of Luke opens with John the Baptist conducting a Q&A session with a gathering crowd.  As a preface to Jesus' ministry and teachings John outlines a few planks of the platform:

"What should we do then?" the crowd asked.

John answered, "The man with two tunics should share with him who has none, and the one who has food should do the same."

Tax collectors also came to be baptized. "Teacher," they asked, "what should we do?"  

"Don't collect any more than you are required to," he told them. 

Then some soldiers asked him, "And what should we do?"

He replied, "Don't extort money and don't accuse people falsely-be content with your pay." 

Luke 3:10-14 (NIV) 

WE are these people.  We need to ask the question, "What should we do?"  

The answer according to John the Baptist:  We should share.  We should take no more than is required. We should no longer use intimidation to get more for less. We should be contented.

But we aren't.  And all of creation is groaning under the weight of our discontent.  If we sat quietly and listened, we would hear the rocks crying out (Luke 19:40).  Now it is our turn to do the same.

Here are several organizations that are helping deal with the Cholera epidemic in Zimbabwe:

• Give to Presbyterian Disaster Assistance (write "Zimbabwe" in the comments box)

• Unicef's emergency response

• Oxfam responds

Here is information on how we can begin to reform our consumptive lifestyles to bring them more in line with John's message:

• Enough for Everyone

• Just Living

• New American Dream

In absence, presence

Each year as Advent begins, I look forward to setting up the Christmas tree. I have a small 4-foot artificial tree that belonged to my grandparents. Many of my ornaments came from them, too. My favorites are the antique European ones—sparkly spheres and teardrops, simple balls in red and silver, and quirky random ones such as shoes and mushrooms—which they acquired while living in post-war Germany during the 1940s and 50s.

 

While I love this little tree, each year I entertain the notion of getting a real one. I long for the heady, comforting scent of a real live Christmas tree to fill my home. Each year I research the options of trees and farms, only to ultimately decide against spending the money and effort. “After all,” I conclude, “there’s a perfectly good tree waiting for me right up the attic stairs.”

 

However, this year is turning out to be different. Somehow when the time came to start thinking about decorating, what came to me was a notion I had never had before: to not decorate at all. To leave the tree in the attic, to leave the ornaments in their trunk, to leave deliberating trees for another year. What came to me was the notion to leave room in this season…for more time…more space…more joy…more quiet. And to see what happens.

 

In the past such a notion would have been outrageous. Decorating for Christmas is just one of those things you do. But this year it felt right to leave the stuff packed away.

 

I did end up indulging one decoration for my home: a length of white pine garland from a nearby farm. At first I was inclined to do what my mother always does—string it with festive lights and tie it with pretty bows. But as I draped the garland along the banister, I realized that to delight each day in this solitary scented garland would be enough. It would be something simple to set the season apart but nothing more. In the absence of all the beloved ornaments and familiar decorations I usually use to fill the space (not to mention the season and my time), the presence of this simple piece of greenery provides a sensory reminder that we are in the season of winter, the season of Advent, the season of waiting.

 

What ways do you engage this season?  How do you simplify the season and open yourself to absence, to presence?

Thinking about Thanksgiving

This year, my wife and I found ourselves at home for Thanksgiving not able to travel back to Oklahoma to be with family.  She worked until four that morning and slept until noon so my daughter and I did most of the cooking.  We had made clover leaf rolls from scratch and two pumpkin pies together. 

Full Disclosure:  We cut a few corners on the pies and used canned Organic pumpkin and pre-made crusts.

While sharing this time with my three year old, memories of cooking with my grandma came rushing back. I explained to my daughter that the measuring spoons she was holding belonged to my grandma.  "We called her Granna," I explained.  "Oh Ya? Ugh Oh!" She "accidentally" dumped a teaspoon of cinnamon on the floor at my feet.

Recently, Michael Pollan was on Bill Moyers Journal.  (If you've not read his Omnivore's Dilemma or In Defense of Food, you're reading list just got two books longer.) Discussing food policy, the Farm Subsidy Bill and changes that need to come under the new administration, Pollan ssummarized the health problems resulting from our current food system by saying: 

"We've gone from 2,000 or 2,300 to 2,600, something like that. We all weigh on average ten pounds more. And lo and behold, we have a serious epidemic of obesity, type 2 diabetes, heart disease, diet-related cancers. All these chronic diseases which is now what kills us basically pretty reliably in America are adding more than $250 billion a year to health-care costs. They are the reason that this generation just being born now is expected to have a shorter lifespan than their parents, that one in three Americans born in the year 2000, according to the Centers for Disease Control, will have type 2 diabetes, which is a really serious sentence. It takes several years off your life. It gives you an 80 percent chance of heart disease. It means you are going to be spending $14,000 a year in added health costs. So this is about how we're eating."

In rebutting the assertion that organic, whole foods are prohibitively expensive Pollan points out that, 

"Cheap food is actually incredibly expensive. If you look at the all the costs, you are talking about the farm subsidies. That's $25 billion a year to make that food cheap. You look at the pollution effects. The quality of the water all through the farm belt, nitrates in the water, moms who can't use tap water because it, you know, blue baby syndrome from nitrogen in the water. You look at the public health costs. You look at the cost to the atmosphere. Agriculture is the biggest contributor to greenhouse gases."

Something he said after Moyers asked what the average person can do to deal with the challenges we face was refreshingly simple.  He said:

"Cook. Simply by starting to cook again, you declare your independence from the culture of fast food. As soon as you cook, you start thinking about ingredients. You start thinking about plants and animals, and not the microwave. And you will find that your diet, just by that one simple act, that is greatly improved. You will find that you are supporting local agriculture, because you'll care about the quality of ingredients.And you know, whether you're cooking or not is one of the best predictors for a healthy diet. It's more important than the class predictor. People with more money generally have healthier diets, but affluent people who don't cook are not as healthy in their eating as poor people who still cook. So, very, very important. If you don't have pots and pans, get them.

Now people say they don't have time, and that's an issue. And I am saying that we do need to invest more time in food. Food is just too important to relegate to these 10-minute corners of our lives. And you know, even if you would just take, you know, we watch cooking shows like crazy on television. We've turned cooking into a spectator sport. If you would merely invest the time you spend watching cooking shows in actually cooking, you would find you've got plenty of time to put a meal on the table."

These two paragraphs contain the same ethos from which Enough for Everyone sprung.  "Do things more simply and live life more fully recognizing the spiritual side of the consumer choices we make."  In preparing Thanksgiving dinner with my daughter, I considered the wide variety of information in "Alternative Thanksgiving Ideas" a piece from our Just Living Series.  We chose a free-range turkey, local yams and made our own bread and pumpkin pie.  We cut a few corners with the packaged stuffing (I chose organic stuffing) and canned organic cranberry sauce (there is something about a dish that retains the shape of its container that I can't do without).

In cooking together, my daughter and I spent quality time together.  We laughed.  We shared.  We took turns.  The big payoff came during the meal.  I could see the unmistakable look of pride on her three year old face when her mom said, "These rolls sure are good.  Who made them?"

"Me and daddy did." 

My heart melted like so many pats of butter on freshly baked bread.      

 

Thinking Sustainably About Thanksgiving

With Thanksgiving quickly approaching, it is time to think about ways in which our celebrations can be made more sustainable. 

Thanksgiving is a uniquely American celebration.  It has changed considerably since the first Thanksgiving, a three day harvest celebration attended by the Wampanoag Indians and Plymouth colonists sometime between September 21 and November 11. In the intervening centuries the American lifestyle has also changed as Europeans crossed the continent leaving settlements in their wake.  The second half of the twentieth century has seen a displacement of rural farmers to the nation's cities.  In fact, the number of cities with a population of more than 50,000 increased from 157 in 1950 to 452 in 2000. 

Increased urbanization has changed the way we get together and how we celebrate on Thanksgiving. 

First, as more people move away from rural America they lose their connection with food production and the land.  Gone is the knowledge and the first hand experience of the plants and animals that provide the meal on which we feast.  As far as many of us know, Turkeys come from the freezer and cranberries are shaped like a can, ridges and all.  With the distance between rural America and the nation's cities comes a lessened appreciation for the fruits of the soil. 

The second effect urbanization has had on Thanksgiving is an increase in highway miles.  Not only is our food shipped over thousands of miles of asphalt and from all directions but our families are so spread out that many of us have to travel hundreds of miles to see parents, grandparents, aunts, or uncles.  It's no wonder that we used 9,017,000 barrels of gasoline per day during November 2007.

This year explore ways to make your holiday celebration more sustainable and less damaging to God's creation. Because the holidays are social events, enlist others to make changes with you.  Plan a pre-holiday get together with friends, family or coworkers to discuss ways in which this holiday season can be less consumptive and more giving. Gather several resources to inform your discussion and distribute them through e-mail or another on-line communication tool before your gathering. (A good starting point is "Alternative Thanksgiving Ideas" a part of Enough for Everyone's Just Living Series.) 

Provide simple fair trade snacks from Equal Exchange or make it a family favorite sampler with everybody contributing a portion of a traditional dish or baked good with the recipe to share.  Allow time to share stories of holidays past and discuss ways in which holiday celebrations can be less energy intensive while capturing those things that make the time special. 

We would love to hear how the discussion goes.  You can let us know on the Just Living Share and Connect page or comment below.

Journey to the Coffee Lands

Enough for Everyone & Equal Exchange

Invite you to join us

Journey to the Coffee Lands Delegation to Nicaragua

January 10 - 17, 2009

Learn about global economic issues and visit coffee and sewing co-operatives. On this trip we will:

• Meet the farmers who grow Fair Trade coffee
• Pick coffee and stay in the homes of farming families
• Visit the women who sew Sweat Free Ts
• See Presbyterian investments in Oikocredit in action
• Learn about the impact of Fair Trade versus conventional trade on communities and families
• Learn about the history and politics of Nicaragua and the economic conditions its people face

For information and an application, contact "awisehart@equalexchange.coop" or call 774-776-7423.

Scholarship funds may be available.

Check out pictures from the 2008 Delegation  on our flikr photostream

Applications for the 2009 Delegation

 

Halloween Is Coming

Smoke Tinged Halloween Moon

It's hard to believe we are more than half way through September.  Soon October will be here and with it the candy smith's favorite holiday outside of Sweetest Day, Halloween.  Already the store shelves are packed with increasingly expensive costumes and Halloween treats.  At my house costume planning began in earnest last night.  "Look daddy, I'm a ghost," my nearly 3 year old said, her bath towel over her head.

My little ghost and I will approach Halloween a little differently this year.  Besides dying her costume pink, which she insists on, we are going to participate in the Global Exchange Reverse Trick-or-Treat.  As I have looked closer at the supply chains that put food on my table and cloths on my back I have become increasingly concerned about the people on the production side of the chain. 

Like our more virtuous holidays, Halloween has been taken over by big business and they are swimming in profits.  According to the National Retail Federation, retailers raked in $5.07 billion last year.  It is estimated that candy sales alone will account for $2.65 billion in sales this year.  Gone are old-fashioned Halloween treats like apples, nuts and caramel popcorn balls.  Gone are the harvest celebrations and mindfulness of God's creation.  In their place the Halloween industrial complex offers "Cool Fan Halloween Pops: a three in one treat for Halloween! Light! Fan! and Candy!!" (You can't make this stuff up.) 

At what cost have these profits come?

According to the US Census Bureau, chocolate and cocoa products are the largest piece of the candy pie. The most important ingredient in chocolate comes from the cacao tree, a native plant to South America.  Cacao trees produce large seed pods, each containing 30 to 50 seeds.  These seeds are dried, roasted and ground.  The fatty part of the seed is removed yielding cocoa butter.  The bitter solids left behind are further ground into cocoa powder.  In 2004 world production of cocoa was 3.6 million tons.

Chocoholics with green thumbs will no doubt wonder how to grow Cacao trees in their backyard.  You should know these are especially finicky plants.  Cacao grows in a band 20 degrees north or south of the equator.  In other words, if you live in the Americas but don't live somewhere between Guadalajara, Mexico and Santa Cruz, Bolivia, you are out of luck.  Even though cacao cultivation began in the Americas, the world's top producers are in Africa.  Nearly 70% of the cacao consumed each year is produced in West African nations including Côte d’Ivoire (37.4%) and Ghana (20.7%).

In 2006 world chocolate sales topped $74 billion.  The economy of the world's largest cacao producer Côte d’Ivoire only saw $1.2 billion of that.  Include environmental degradation, harsh working conditions and forced child labor and the real cost of cocoa production in West Africa skyrockets as the profits evaporate.  The people at the front end of the chain are squeezed ever harder to increase profits at the other end. 

How does this relate to Halloween celebrations in our country?  As is the case with so many consumer goods, the chocolate supply chain between cacao fields in the tropics and my daughter's Trick or Treat bag in temperate Louisville, KY are obfuscated by clever marketing and circuitous purchasing practices.  The truth is as millions of American children, on one side of the chain, don over priced costumes and go door to door in search for candy, an estimated 284,000 West African children toil in abusive labor conditions on the other side.  The direct link between hyper-consumption and child labor should leave a lump in one's stomach much larger than fifteen snack size candy bars ever could. 

There are other alternatives.

Reverse Trick or Treat

This year, instead of supporting the status quo, make a statement against it.  Global Exchange offers Reverse Trick-or-Treat to increase awareness of the issues surrounding conventional chocolate production.  Participants order kits from Global Exchange.  Each kit contains samples of Fair Trade chocolate, which are given to the adults they visit.  Each chocolate is attached to a card with more information about the supply chain and labor problems in the cacao industry and how Fair Trade certified chocolate provides a more sustainable and fair option.  The program is free and first come first served.  The deadline is October 13 so order today.  Order Here.  More Information

Take Fair Trade practices into more of your Halloween festivities with Fair Trade decorations and gifts available here.

Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF

UNICEF has long been an advocate for children in need of clean water, better eduction and medical care.  Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF gives kids a way to get involved in grassroots fund-raising.  Participants bring collection boxes or homemade canisters with them trick-or-treating.  They then request a small donation from each house visited. At the end of the night a donation is made either by phone, the Internet or mail. 

Both options put a new spin on family traditions.  What better way to celebrate God's bounty than sharing it with those in need? 

A World Without Power

This past week Hurricane Ike ravaged much of the country. We had been told that the storm would largely miss us and that winds would be around 30 MPH. The forecast was wrong.   Surprisingly, Ike's remnants hit Louisville harder than anyone expected. Louisville was hit by winds up to 75 MPH and not a drop of rain. Winds from Ike knocked out power to more than 375,000 people in our area. This is the largerst power outage in Louisville's history.

I was one of the people who lost electrical power. To my knowledge it still isn't back and may not be for a long time. Initially, I wasn't really bothered by the power loss. I didn't think that it would be out for very long. When I received word to eat the perishables in my fridge, I knew that this was a different sort of power outage. The power restoration efforts were given to me not in hours, but in days or weeks. I was now facing a world without power.

This new world was pretty alien to me. I could, and still did, flip light switches as I entered a room. I suppose I can say that the shock of the event has not yet worn off as I am still surprised when the lights do not come on. When night falls the world becomes dominated by flashlight birthed shadows scurrying across the landscape. Mealtimes bear community as neighbors come together to care for one another. We don't have FEMA or municipal support where I live, but I know that there are many dedicated people trying to restore the power to all who have been affected. I have lost some and the conditions are far from ideal, but throughout this time I think I have gained more than I lost.

What I did lose amounts to a fridge/freezer full of food. While that is a big loss and was difficult, I realize that I have gained a greater sense of community. This disaster, though calling it a disaster feels a little extreme to me, has brought the community I live in closer together. People  share what they have with one another: food, tea lights, company, and stories. We can get together and complain about the cold showers, the reading by candlelight, and the building fire alarm that sounds around four in the morning each night. Community games are also played and there are times when the world feels surprisingly normal.

There are also times when we have gotten together to pray for others who have been hit much harder than we were. Yes, we have lost some of what made our lives livable and comfortable, but this will come back soon enough. Throughout this event I have found great hope in how the community has come together where I live. I hope that people are finding similar support in other regions of the country that have been hit by the storm and continue to pray for people from Galveston to Chicago who have had their worlds turned upside down from this hurricane.

Introductions are in order

Allow me to introduce myself:

I'll start with the basics.  My name is Ben Randell.  I live in Louisville, Kentucky with my wife and daughter.  I have a dog named Lucy and I'm a member of Crescent Hill Presbyterian Church.

My journey to this time and place in my life is a little circuitous.  I'm originally from a small town in central Oklahoma.  My grandpa is a retired Free Will Baptist minister and had a hand in naming me after that denomination's founder, Benjamin Randall.  Every Sunday and Wednesday, he picked me up for church.  On the way to my grandparent's house for lunch, he and I would discuss the day's sermon or anything else that would come to mind.  He has had a big influence on my faith journey. 

As an answer to the inevitable questions about my current church affiliation, I like to say, "I grew up Free Will Baptist.  I went to a Southern Baptist university where I became a Presbyterian."  You may have a similar story about how you came to worship God where you do. 

I got my feet wet in the environmental movement early in undergrad.  When reading the textbook for environmental biology, I learned the scope of the problem and realized, "I have a lot to learn."  I began to explore on my own, which at times was a source of discomfort.  I became suspicious of my drinking water after reading Rachel Carson's Silent Spring.  Henry David Thoreau's Walden had me wishing for a simpler time in US history.  I learned in John McPhee's The Control of Nature the folly of drastically changing the environment to protect our self interest.  And with Resource Wars, Michael Klare drew my attention to the political ramifications of our insatiable appetite for natural resources.  All the while, I was reminded of what God said to the first humans:

"Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it."  Genesis 1:28a (KJV)

I look forward to working with Enough for Everyone and meeting the many people that take part in its programs.  I am glad to be here putting my knowledge and experience into helping "Replenish the Earth."