ecospirit

“We cannot fail in Katowice.”  So Secretary General Guterres warned in Poland last week at the outset of the COP 24 conference of parties to the UNFCCC convention, which began in 1992. Nine years ago, at the pivotal COP 15 in Copenhagen, I was among those who saw a glimmer of hope. But the politicians, those who manage the form the awakening must take for humanity to unite to prevent climate catastrophe, have provided scant leadership over these 25 years, during which CO2 emissions have increased 65%. 

It’s that time of year again, when Advent coincides with the COP.   The challenge in Katowice, which is to outline a firm mechanism for achieving the carbon reduction goals pledged by 197 nations in Paris in 2015,  is inconvenient for the nations of the world. They would rather deal with slightly less intractable issues.  And it is inconvenient to Christians who don’t yet understand that, unless we have a viable species, we can’t worship the coming of the Christ-child. 

I recently had an online debate with a colleague who claimed that “Politics is the major determinant of our lives.”  I disagreed, pointing to instances where individuals overcame the external determinants of politics through inner spiritual development.  But if we do not have a form to ensoul in, my point is moot.  So, building upon his point, I will amend it to “Climate politics is the major determinant  for the survival of our species.”  Some  people, their numbers probably accelerating as we approach the Event Horizon (not a Christianized Saturnalia, but the Incarnation as we never imagined it), will achieve enlightenment/moksha.  But the billions who will require bodies in which to reincarnate to complete their spiritual perfection will be out of options – at least in the universe as we know it.

When I carried hope for the UN-led process, Barack Obama was president. He went personally to COP15, where he brokered the outlines of an agreement with the president of China, then our biggest opponent in the process of drawing up an international treaty to fight climate disruption.  At COP 24, China is the leader of the forces attempting to drive a wedge against the Climate Beast, while the US is working with Russia  and the Saudis to weaken the framework set in Paris.  At COP 24, with Donald Trump having served notice that the US will withdraw form the Paris Accord as soon as contractually possible, the US has been further reduced from irrelevancy to laughing stock.  Our executive, executor of the international goodwill towards the US that has been built since WWII, seized the COP24 stage to sell US coal, his agents improbably arguing that the right mix of fossils would help in the climate war. This may have delighted his base in the US, but the assembled company in Katowice literally laughed at the presentation. Sadly, extinction is no joke.

“Our world leaders have been behaving like children.”  This is the judgment of my latest climate hero, Greta Thunberg, the Swedish 15-year-old who has been on strike from school in an effort to get political leaders to awaken from their moral torpor.  Greta speaks from Stockholm every Friday.  At first, she stood outside Parliament, where the cameras delivered a clear message.  Now Parliament has forced her to move over the bridge, but those who are initiated into her courage don’t need the government trappings to get her point.  In Katowice, where she has been featured in several venues, including an address to the hall of delegates, Greta has made it clear that “we” - the youth who are present in force at the conference, “are not here to beg world leaders to act,” but to serve notice that, since those leaders have consistently failed us, the people, led by those in their teens and twenties, will get the job done themselves.  

In the UK, where Theresa May has withdrawn the Brexit deal for lack of votes, and public unrest like that tearing France apart is waiting in the wing, the other wing is soaring.  The Extinction Rebellion, which means exactly what it says, was able to stop traffic in London, simultaneously occupying five bridges. Then  with a sit-in of over one thousand, they blocked access to Parliament,. In just a matter of weeks, they have over 100,000 members world-wide.  I am one of them.

Back in the US, the youthful Sunrise Movement blocked access to Nancy Pelosi’s office two weeks ago to demand that she lead a Green New Deal package as her top priority for the new Congress in January.  A colleague drives his high school daughter to the actions, and reports an impressive degree of political sophistication and passion among the youthful protesters. 

Greta Thunberg has called for a global climate strike by students today, December 14.  There are already large-scale school strikes in Australia, with Canada also gaining energy and numbers.  I sense that this is just the beginning, and my readers can help drive the momentum. Stand with Greta on Fridays at government offices, schools, and other public places. Write letters to the editor. More importantly, recored your own strike event and share it widely.  This is what an extinction rebellion looks like.

Labels: Advent, COP24, Copenhagen COP 15, Event Horizon, Extinction Rebellion, global climate strike, Greta Thunberg, Paris Accord, Sunrise Movement, UNFCCC

After the fraught negotiations at COP 15 in Copenhagen, widely considered an abject failure I posted about a “tiny advent star,” the most modest of hopes. Today, as I sat down to draft my response to COP 20 in Lima, I read what a friend had written about the nature of working on the daunting issue of climate politics. In response to another woman's concerns for the right strategy and the most effective action, she said, “Just stick to your square in the quilt,” not knowing what the final patchwork might be. We arrive at the task of our particular square through a process of following our leadings, and paying careful attention to signs, both inner and outer, that confirm or disconfirm our path. Like the evolutionary process itself, we self-correct as we go, using the feedback process from the entire context of our work

Labels: Advent, carbon market, COP 15 and 20, Copenhagen, ex-ante process, Lima, Narendra Modi, Paris climate accord, patchwork quilt, Quaker Earthcare Witness, UNFCCC

Saturday, December 19

That was how I entitled a discussion group post the eve of the climate summit in Copenhagen. The next day, I broke six weeks' silence at Meeting with ministry on a haunting Gaelic carol, Christ often comes in the stranger's guise, reminding Friends that, in the climate emergency, it is the poor and island countries who are the stranger at the table. They were indeed present at the table in Copenhagen, but were lucky to get even crumbs from the repast. If Copenhagen has proved the impotence of our international political system, what are we to make of Solstice 2009, and the hope of Advent?

Yesterday, as the COP-15 talks concluded in a whirlwind of desperate diplomacy, I went for a walk with my wife Geeta in the fresh deep snow of our drive. Hemlocks, pines, and rhodos hung low, heavy with snow. Mirroring Copenhagen coming up with so little, the forest seemed to bow, draped in sympathy with the colossal failure of the international political system. It reinforced my deep sadness.

I mentioned this to Geeta, and she laughed, recognizing the pathetic fallacy. But I went deeper than sympathetic magic, recognizing that they are bowing to the Earth. The earth and all her myriad creation, yes, but also honoring her as natura naturans, the infinitely creative matrix of life. Gaia may well be in mourning as the deepest of Solstice nights approached, but she still retains the miraculous power to produce new life-forms.

Then, last night, as I played a variety of seasonal music, marking the whole scope of the seaon, I felt a deep sweetness, surrounded by darkness marked by white tree-sentinels. This was indeed a pivotal Solstice for humanity, and we may now be heading towards climate disaster. If so, I remind readers that emotionally, it is the same as facing personal death within a web of family. Experiencing the “last time” with our loved ones is both immensely sad, and for some, fearful, but at the same time it can be sweet, harvesting the richness and depth we have created through faithful relationships.

So I cherish each little bird I hear singing, rather than remembering when there were more. I admire the grace and beauty of the deer who eat my garden. I delight in the constant number of chattering, busy squirrels, still fed by our stand of hickories in a Southern Appalachian forest that remains, for a while longer, oak-hickory.

If you know your family well, but not the earth-place that gives you a home, then by all means, get to know that place while it still has some integrity. Even if we are headed into a downward spiral, there is so much to cherish.

And as the brave folks at 350.org remind us all today, through we lost a big battle yesterday, the war for climate justice goes on, and the cadre of climate warriors could welcome a boost. But first, gather 'round with those you love, get outside despite the weather and greet your earth-place and its denizens. Enjoy a sabbath. Then, with the New Year, be ready to bring it on again, and that's going to mean holding Congress to the task of passing climate and energy legislation worthy of the science and faithful to the cause of climate justice.

This is obviously no mean task, but when you come to the end of the road, will you look back and see that you were too preoccupied with your own comfort to join the biggest moral campaign in history? Weakened by a rebellious Congress, our political savior had no prophetic rallying cry, only scrappy diplomacy to round up some key developing nations, promising to do more next time. The real heroes at Copenhagen were the little countires who wouldn't fold on the rack of pressure, and the people in the streets, including all the NGO's progressively ousted from the negotiating hall, massing outside as the summit headed into virtual deadlock. Our leaders have failed us; now leadership needs to come from the people.

It's our turn to lead, friends, each in ways that we never dreamed we could. The courage and creativity are all there, if only we have the faith to dig for it.

Labels: 350.org, Advent, COP-15, Copenhagen, natura naturans, oak-hickory forest, Solstice