In my last posting we saw how Pope Francis in Laudato Si (LS)[1] accorded education – environmental education – a crucial role in meeting the challenges of the ecological crisis. The crisis is dire.
We unwittingly educate our children towards consumerism. Unwittingly, because often this consumerism is not reflected on and decided on deliberately in determining the way the family lives. It is in the air, in what people see, small, taste, wear, want and covet. Especially if their neighbors or friends already have it. It is in the tools they use, the gadgets they tote, the gifts they give, the gods they worship. The Malls, the temples of consumerism, provide not only the Sunday recreational space; they allocate the space in the consumer world for the chapel of God. The values of consumerism are part of societies' regulative meanings; they determine desires and dreams, dos and don'ts, triumphs and catastrophes, all based on the amounts of goods or services one can acquire, consume, and replenish. To further consume. Or flaunt.
But consumerism, as we saw in last week's blog, fuels the technocratic paradigm[2] willy nilly. The technocratic paradigm responds to consumer drives by creating a plethora of desirable products through an increasingly creative and astute use of technology. To make its products, it abuses of the earth, destroys its mountains, pollutes its rivers and seas, deprives diverse species of their natural habitats. It awards its owners and technical attendants richly. But it throws away those human beings irrelevant to this production process.
Consumerism leaves the heart of the human being empty, even when the human being already owns many of the products consumerism and its technocratic paradigm offer. There is a discord, a lack of balance or equilibrium, between what the human being possesses and what the human heart desires, between the overloaded shopping carts and the empty hearts. There is no balance between some human beings who possess in great quantity and quality, consume with abandon, are overweight and diseased in obesity, and others who are emaciated, wasted and stunted because they do not have the basic nourishment that can sustain their lives. There is no balance between the insatiable consumerism of the human species and the ability of the planet to survive their abuse. Or even just to protect the human life the planet now sustains.
That is why for Francis, where there is such imbalance, it is so urgent that good education accompany people to ecological equilibrium[3] – overcoming a postmodern crisis in humanity and arriving at a renewed modern humanity – a humanity able to accept facts and locate itself confidently within such a meta-narrative of creation, sin, redemption and profound union with Creation as Christianity offers.
Environmental education must lead people to the recovered freedom of the new human being. The new person can choose the good over the evils of consumerism, make a new start, rise above him/herself, recognize and accept limits to consumption imposed by reality, and cultivate a genuine sense of the common good. All these can lead to new paths of authentic freedom, enabling a change in lifestyle that calls forth a new covenant between the human being and the environment (cf. LS, 205-207).
This ecological equilibrium establishes harmony, peace, and reconciliation within ourselves, with others, with nature and other living creatures, and with God. For Francis, the metaphysical leap to the transcendent creator God is only rational. But it anticipates what he will later call ecological conversion, and which I too cannot not anticipate. It is what Jesuits consider to be substantial to their mission: participation in the work of the Father reconciling humanity to himself, human beings with each other, and human beings with creation. The latter however is not only a rational reconciliation of human beings with the world of things surrounding them. It is a graced reconciliation between humanity and "the environment" – the created world, humanity, and the Creator – a new covenant towards shared thriving under a benevolent God.
In this context, education helps humans to grow in solidarity, responsibility and compassionate care. In solidarity: in acceptance of their connectedness not only to other human beings but also to other creatures under the compassionate Creator, especially the poor, the marginalized, the discarded, the endangered old-growth forests, the poisoned rivers, the imperiled coral reefs, and therefore their need to work for social justice as well as for environmental justice. In responsibility: in personal and collective growth in a shared duty to protect and preserve creation for future generations; it implies increasing awareness of the consequences of their actions and lifestyles on this planet that perpetuate social and environmental injustice, bringing them to act in ways that promote social justice and environmental sustainability. In compassionate care: a love and concern for people and the environment. It involves empathy and the capacity to care for the earth and its inhabitants in a tangible, active way. It involves addressing immediate needs but also long-term solutions that promote human dignity and ecological balance.[4]
All this leads to a personal conversion where people respond to the environmental crisis not with words, words, words, or with merely the erudite discourse of environmental science, but in a selfless ecological commitment to make a personal contribution to bringing about ecological equilibrium. Here, confronting the gargantuan crisis experienced in raging forest fires, intensified typhoons, melting glaciers, rising sea levels and diminishing sources of fresh water against a consumerist skyline of thirsty skyscrapers, people must be willing to live and act in favor of the environment, even in ways that may appear inconsequential: in obeying laws and ordinances against pollution, in refusing to use single-use plastics, in separating trash, in minimizing use of the air-conditioner, in minimizing use of the clothes dryer, in minimizing use of the private car, in walking more, in learning the names of the native trees, in noticing the colors of the egrets, the kingfishers and the orioles, and in stopping to smell the flowers. Francis says, "All of these reflect a generous and worthy creativity which brings out the best in human beings" (LS, 211).
"We must not think these efforts are not going to change the world. They benefit society often unbeknownst to us, for they call forth a goodness which, albeit unseen, inevitably tends to spread. Furthermore, such actions can restore our sense of self-esteem; they can enable us to live more fully and to feel that life on earth is worthwhile? (LS, 212).
For Francis this is not just an ideology, a philosophy, or a scientific theory. It is "an ecological spirituality" that can "motivate us to a more passionate concern for the protection of the world" and support the loftiness or depth of our ecological conversion, "an interior impulse which encourages, motivates, nourishes and gives meaning to our individual and communal activity" (LS, 216) in favor of the environment. In this Christian ecological conversion, as I have anticipated above, "the effects of their encounter with Jesus Christ become evident in their relationship with the world around them. Living our vocation to be protectors of God's handiwork is essential to a life of virtue; it is not an optional or a secondary aspect of our Christian experience" (LS, 217). It is essential not only for Jesuits but more basically for members of the Church in our shared mission of participating in the Father's work of reconciliation. We participate. But it is the Father's work accomplished through his Son in the Church inspired by the Spirit.
In this context Paul's words inspire me: "Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he or she is a new creature: the old things passed away; behold new things have come. Now all these things are from God, who reconciled us to himself through Christ and give us the ministry of reconciliation, namely, that God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and He has committed to us the message of reconciliation (2 Cor. 5:17-19).
As Pope Francis is inspired by the example of St. Francis of Assisi who in regarding creatures spoke the language of fraternity and could not hold back his praise of their Creator[5]:
Praised be you, my Lord,
with all Your creatures,
especially Sir Brother Sun,
who is the day,
and through whom You give us light.
And he is beautiful
and radiant with great splendor;
and bears a likeness of You, Most High one.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through Sister Moon and the stars,
in heaven, You formed them
clear and precious and beautiful.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through Brother Wind,
and through the air, cloudy and serene,
and every kind of weather
through which you give substance to your creatures.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through Sister water,
who is very useful and humble
and precious and chaste.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through Brother fire,
through whom You light the night,
and he is beautiful and playful
and robust and strong.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through our Sister Mother Earth,
who sustains and governs us,
and who produces various fruit
with colored flowers and herbs.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through those who give pardon for Your love,
and bear infirmity and tribulation.
Blessed those who endure in peace,
for by You, Most High, shall they be crowned.
Praised be You, my Lord,
through our Sister Bodily Death,
from whom no one living can escape.
Woe to those who die in mortal sin.
Blessed are those whom death
will find in Your most holy will,
for the second death shall do them no harm.
Praise and bless my Lord and give Him thanks
and serve Him with great humility.
[1] Laudato Si', Encyclical Letter of Pope Francis on Care for our Common Home (Vatican: 2015).
[2] The technocratic paradigm is a central concern of Pope Francis in Laudato Si (cf. LS, 106-114).
[3] Education "seeks also to restore the various levels of ecological equilibrium, establishing harmony within ourselves, with others, with nature and other living creatures, and with God. Environmental education should facilitate making the leap towards the transcendent which gives ecologicao ethics its deepest meaning" (LS, 210).
[4] Amplifications on solidarity, responsibility and compassionate care with the assistance of AI through CHAT GPT.
[5] Francis of Assisi, Canticle of Creatures. cf. https://www.laudatosi.org/the-letter/the-canticle-of-creatures/
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