What can be said about a bar of soap and our faith and relation to the world around us?
Claudio Oliver has spent 20 years working with the urban poor, and on community development, dental and medical projects, team equipping, and teaching in Curitiba, Brazil.
He shares just a few of the reflections one small bar of soap can spark — spiritual, sociologic, entropologic and ecologic.
Continue reading The parable of the bar of soap
Texas oilman T.Boone Pickens is pushing wind and natural gas these days. As some have suggested, the former billionaire oilman has had a “come-to-Jesus moment” and realizes the problems with American spending $700 billion on oil each year.
He’s got a number of videos on YouTube now along with a fancy new website explaining his plan. Makes since to me, but I haven’t explored everything about it.
Here’s his TV commercial ::
And an explanation of his plan ::
He mentions that his plan will take less than 10 years to achieve but will take the right leader to get the job done. Wonder who he thinks that should/would be.
Gas prices have actually started to drop – ever so slightly in our neck of the woods. I doubt it will continue much more.
Now that more and more folks are turning to public transportation when and where they can and reducing their consumption of oil intake — the powers that be realize they can getaway with $4 gas – but probably not much more…. for now.
But as gas prices have risen – so has the price of food – and yet no one’s made much of a stink about “big ag.” Could it be because everyone’s too busy making a fuss about “big oil?” Or is it because big ag keeps pointing the finger at big oil?
Either way, Herrick Kimball, the Deliberate Agrarian, seems to think big ag’s profits are a greater concern.
Personally I am far more concerned with the huge profits currently being made by big agricultural industries (BigAg) than I am with BigOil. Food is an absolute necessity for every human on earth. Oil is not.
Food production and distribution is, of course, intertwined with fossil fuels, but not inextricably, Believe it or not, civilization can (and will) survive without an overabundance of crude oil. We have around six thousand years of pre-oil human history to prove that. People are resourceful. They can adapt to such changes. At least some can.
But food is another story. There are currently millions of people in the world facing significant hardship, malnutrition, and even starvation over this matter of food. Why? Because they and their countries are dependent on BigAg’s food, the cost of which is rising at alarming rates. And all the while, the BigAg corporations are making record profits.
I tend to agree. What about you? Be sure and read the rest of his post.
Related ::
DART – Dallas Area Rapid Transit
DART’s Chairman Report May 08
The Deliberate Agrarian :: Big Ag…Big Profits…Big Problems
SSL :: simply living simple
SSL :: simply living simple pt 2
Well I promised I’d try and share some of the things Laurie and I are currently doing to live simply.
I’m not sharing this list because I want to brag about what we do, or because we’ve got it all figured out and we do it right all the time. I’m just sharing this list because they’re some things that we’ve found that work for us (as in – “Hey! We can do this!”). Laurie may have some additions to this list (I hope she does).
Invest in others – Laurie and I are both involved in several groups where community and relationships are built. We are both part of a community group that meets each Tuesday night in the home of friends and we share life and God. Laurie also now meets weekly with several friends on Thursday night to just spend time building those relationships and I’m involved in a Bible study/discussion for men on Wednesday morning (the men’s What-a-Study) and typically meet with one or two other guys at different times during the week.
Recycle – we’re not doing near enough yet (in my opinion) but we’re doing a lot more than we used to. We recycle our aluminum cans, plastic and glass thanks to city recycling program. We should probably add cardboard and paper to the mix – but we haven’t taken the time to store and deliver paper products to a recycling site (mental note: add that to the goal list).
Utilizing public transportation – I’m a big fan of public transportation, especially good systems like DART. Granted, the old joke remains, “The thing I hate about public transportation is the public.” Sure there are days when folks can annoy you and get on your last nerve – but we save a great deal of money on gas and parking each month with my monthly DART pass. On top of that, it gives me an opportunity to actually be in fellowship with others rather than tuning the world out as I climb in my truck all by myself.
Using CFLs – We’ve switched all but just a few lights in our house to new CFL or LED bulbs. We need to find some good CFLs that look good above our bathroom mirrors, but otherwise I think all of our lights have been changed to money saving CFLs.
Utilize an automatic thermostat – This is one of those ways we’re easily putting technology to use to try and save money and automate our air conditioning/heating needs. We also utilize ceiling fans in our main rooms of use (including a brand new one I installed in our office today). While this may be too warm for some folks, we keep our thermostat at 78° F while we’re home and at 85° F during the day. We just discussed the possibility of lowering that day time temperature to 80 or 82 so our AC doesn’t run as long in the evening to cool the house off again. We haven’t found any substantial evidence as to which is best for efficiency, cost and wear and tear on our AC. While our winter bill was a bit higher, we’ve had 2 months of spring/summer electric bills of $70 or less!
We’ve discussed other areas we can improve on or start doing including:
Well there’s you a starting point. Any thoughts, ideas or suggestions?
Be sure and check out Shaun Groves’ latest post to see some of his goals as well.
I read an interesting view on “mother nature” yesterday and why Christians often have a hard time with living green or caring for nature (aka natural conservation – which sounds like the very essence of a conservative).
First off, because most Christians believe the earth is going to be destroyed in the end – so why should we worry with protecting the environment?
Secondly because most Christians traditionally consider themselves “conservative” there is a tendency to be against anything and everything those “liberals” are for.
And third, the idea of a “mother earth” seems mystical or too spiritual or giving too much authority to the rest of creation. It also seems to reflect a Darwinist viewpoint that we all evolved from a single cell somewhere that was birthed my “mother earth.” And I think in addition, there’s a fear that “treehuggers” have taken it their love of God’s creation to the extreme. Some how the dolphins and Pygmy Three-toed Sloths have become more important than humans and well – we can’t have that.
So how about this? What if rather than using the term, “Mother Earth” which tends to give a higher authority to the rest of God’s creation – we used a new term, “Sister Earth?” After all, we do have the same Father/Creator.
Thoughts? Ideas? Have you faced some of the same struggles? Do you care?
From the Reformergent:
As the first move by a major publisher of Bibles, Thomas Nelson, Inc. has decided to no longer mass produce synthetic bounded Bibles, but switch to a more eco-friendly alternative. Thomas Nelson also were the publishers behind McLaren’s Everything Must Change, which specifically points out that the book is printed on eco-friendly material. I have to say, good job Thomas Nelson for making the switch. So now as Americans we can start buying up the eco-friendly Bibles to add to our Bible shelf, and send away all of our synthetic ones to areas of the world where they can start polluting their environment with materials that don’t decompose.