Guest Blogger: November 2009 Archives

Sung-ok Lee is the Assistant General Secretary of the Section of Christian Social Action, Women's Division of the United Methodist Women.

For many in government and industry circles, the discussion around the topic of climate change crisis focuses on energy efficiency, cap and trades and adjusting environmental policy to meet financial and economic ends.  For people all over the world, it's a very real crisis, the effects of which they are already witnessing.  But for many people of faith, including me, climate change is a primary moral challenge of our time, and the upcoming United Nations Summit on Climate Change gives us a unique opportunity to call attention to the need to reverse this dangerous trend.

As believers, we see the need to tackle climate change as a matter of social justice. Yes, it's true that we cherish and want to preserve Creation, but we are also keenly aware that while the poorest 1 billion people on the planet are responsible for only 3 percent of total emissions, they disproportionately bear the brunt of the devastating effects of climate change as their homelands suffer exacerbated droughts and floods, unpredictable rain patterns and crop failures. By contrast, the U.S. and other wealthy nations have benefited greatly from growth and prosperity fueled by carbon-based economies. Although our nation comprises only about 4-5% of the world's population, we are responsible for about 25% of historical emissions. 

I am also concerned about the effects of climate change on women and girls the world over.  This week, the UN Population Fund (UNFPA) released a report called State of World Population 2009.  What it reveals in terms of the impact of global warming on women and girls around the world is startling.  The report points out that the female half of the world's population is indeed disproportionately more affected by the effects of climate change. 

While it's true that all around the planet people are feeling the effects of global warming, women in developing countries are among the most vulnerable because they tend to make up a larger share of the agricultural workforce and typically don't have access to income-generating opportunities.  Because they are in charge of households and family care, women are limited in their mobility, so that when tragedy strikes in the form of weather-related natural disasters, they are highly susceptible to the loss of livelihood, home, loved ones or event their own lives.

UNFPA's report highlights how girls often drop out of school to help their mothers secure food, water and energy.  As climate affects their livelihoods, women often bear the increased financial burden by taking on extra jobs to support their families.  Of greater consequence is that while stuck in this cycle of deprivation, poverty and inequality, these women and girls are unable to build the necessary social capital - like education, political power, and influence in their communities - to effectively take on climate change.

As global leaders gather in Copenhagen next month for the UN Summit on Climate Change, a four-person delegation of United Methodist Women committed to social justice will travel to Denmark to lend their voices to the women and the many others who are not able to attend and speak for themselves.  The team hopes to meet fellow advocates and learn what other organizations and governments the world over are doing to combat climate change.  The delegation will not only to press for strong, binding and fair greenhouse gas emissions targets, but will also demand that the U.S. join other nations to provide adaptation aid to the most vulnerable communities.

It is crucial that the governments of the U.S. and other industrialized nations responsible for greenhouse gas emissions implement effective and comprehensive, science-based approaches to reversing global warming.  As women of faith and advocates for social justice, we see it as our duty to hold global leaders accountable and ask that they assist developing nations to adapt to climate change, address energy poverty, and grow in ways that reduce poverty while protecting the environment.

Rev. Donna Schaper is the Senior Pastor at the Judson Memorial Church in New York City.    

William James in his marvelous book, THE VARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE, speaks of the transition from Catholicism to Protestantism as the transition of the brocaded, artistic, colorful Baroque to one man in a black suit carrying a black book which he places on a plain table in an unornamented meeting house.  His observations are on target.   There is nothing perfect about Protestantism.  Still it has a few values that might make a non-violent approach possible for those of us who spiritually and theologically value the right to choose an abortion.  With Hillary Clinton, many of us think abortion should be safe, legal and rare.  We also think it is a constitutionally guaranteed right.  We also have respect for the constitutional promotion of a brocaded right to the separation of church and state.

When Roman Catholics take up a separate offering to remove abortion from federal funding and send their people home with an experience of the body of Christ - and a postcard to send to their congressional representatives - they violate both the body of Christ and the constitution.  These are not small matters.  Some of us are tempted to do more than growl: our stomachs churn at the deeper issue of one theology dominating another, illegally.  Some of us find ourselves filling up with a kind of hate at injustice, abuse of the constitution, power gone amok.  Some women are wearing T-shirts saying that we are feminists formerly for Obama.  Not me: I see what he is up against. We surely understand the President's dilemma and praise our baroque friends for their protection of immigrants, gays, even women to a point in the new and overall positive health care bill.  We sense ourselves eating different bread but not being part of a different body.

The reason hate is so tempting is that we are in fact so close to our Roman Catholic brothers and sisters.  In the name of all that is good about Jesus and his international body, I spend a good bit of time praying for the hate and anger to subside.  I also pray for the right lawsuit to stop my sisters and brothers from abusing the constitution by handing out post cards and taking up special offerings.   Protestants may be plain but we frown on this sort of imperial moral legislating.  We actually believe in the separation of Church and State and hope no (consenting and believing) Catholic will ever have an abortion.

It is not hateful to call to account. Nor is it hateful to enjoy the right to be different.  While frowning on the temptation to hate a group of unmarried men, namely the bishops, who don't even represent their people, who believe more than not in the right to choose an abortion being protected by the federal government, we who are hurt and we who will be hurt by the lack of funding for abortions have a right to call for strong countervailing action.  A good lawsuit against the postcards would go a long way towards resolving this dilemma.  Then we might go back to living on a fair and even playing field when it comes to politics, theocracies and women's rights.

Tom Krattenmaker is a Portland, Oregon-based writer specializing in religion in public life and a member of the USA Today Board of Contributors. He is the author of the new book "Onward Christian Athletes" examining Christian engagement with pro sports. 

            It's midday Sunday. Soon I'll be watching the Minnesota Vikings--the pro football team of my dreams since I was eight--playing the Green Bay Packers. I'll be watching. But not with a clear conscience.

It's becoming harder and harder not to feel creepy about enjoying and supporting an enterprise that uses up men's bodies--and healthy brains--for the sake of entertaining the masses each weekend of the football season.

            The ugly and increasingly unavoidable reality about pro football was brought home for me last week by two chilling articles.

One, by the New Yorker's Malcolm Gladwell, explored the mounting piles of evidence of the devastating effects of football-playing on the combatants' heads and cognitive health. As Gladwell provocatively asked, is football all that dissimilar from the "sport" of dog-fighting that we unanimously reject as cruel and barbaric?

The other convicting piece was a blog post at the Sojourner's website in which writer and football fan Ernesto Tinajero said Gladwell's piece had hit him "like a ton of bricks." He announced that he has watched his last Super Bowl.

I wonder if I'm on my way toward a similar declaration.

Truthfully, the bloom has been coming off the pro football (and pro sports) rose for me gradually over the past seven or eight years. In researching and writing my recently published book "Onward Christian Athletes" on Christian engagement with pro sports, I've had to examine the object of my fandom with a critical eye and a scholar's skepticism.

What was once fun and games for me--drama, eye-popping athleticism, the thrill of victory and agony of defeat--has become increasingly tarnished by my awareness of the profit-driven abuses and excesses of big-time sports in America. I have come to see our fixation on the sports spectacle as borderline idolatrous and largely unproductive in a time when so many urgent common-good needs are going unmet.

As a progressive, I have also found pro sports disturbingly complicit in the promotion of militaristic patriotism and religious nationalism. As I explore in my book, sports-world Christianity has often aligned strongly with the Christian Right ideology and interests that have harmed not just our national politics, but Christianity itself.

The taste in my mouth just got worse.

To read Gladwell's article is to feel your good conscience absorb a bone-crunching tackle by Ray Lewis or one of the other ferocious linebackers roaming the fields of the NFL. Retired players are experiencing off-the-charts rates of dementia brought on by the innumerable blows to the head that are a fact of life in pro football. We are witnessing more tales of ex-players suffering breakdowns, cognitive dysfunction and/or suicide. (Cases in point: Mike Webster and Andre Waters.)

            Gladwell's gift is his ability to see things, and show them, in a different light. Given the drama around NFL quarterback Michael Vick and his incarceration for running a dog-fighting ring, Gladwell's comparison of football and dog-fighting is a highly effective attention-grabber. And absolutely convicting for anyone with a religious and/or moral compass. It has me asking how I can continue enjoying pro football knowing that some of those players entertaining me will end up with their brains scrambled and their lives in shreds.

Imagine the dilemma for the Christian men and ministry organizations that have helped make pro sports, and football in particular, one of the most outwardly religious sectors in American popular culture. Since the formation of the Fellowship of Christian Athletes more than a half-century ago, sports ministry has devoted itself to leveraging the visibility and influence of big-time sports to reach the public with the evangelistic message. It's called using "The Platform." But what if the platform is becoming so morally degraded that it robs the gospel message of any authenticity and credibility?

            This unfolding drama is shot through with other dilemmas as well.

            Contemplate the bind in which Commissioner Roger Goodell and the rest of the pro football power structure find themselves. If they appear dismissive or calloused about the mounting evidence and alarm, and a public relations disaster awaits. Exhibiting too much concern could lead them down a dead-end alley. Let's face it: Other than forcing players to wait longer before returning to action after concussions, there appears to be little that football can do to protect players from head injuries without turning football into something other than the action-packed, high-thrill (and violent) spectacle that it is.

            To say there is a lot at stake is an understatement. Pro football is an enormous money-making enterprise, its two most valuable franchises (Washington and Dallas) worth an estimated $952 million and $851 million, respectively, in 2008.

            I can't help thinking, too, about the race overlay. Like pro basketball, the NFL draws most of its talent from the African American community, meaning it's mainly black guys getting their heads bashed Sunday after Sunday. One has to be careful about going too far with this; the dynamics of football competition being what they are, offensive linemen appear to be the ones most exposed to head injury, and that's a "trade" within the NFL where large numbers of white men still find employment. Nevertheless, Gladwell's likening of pro football to dog-fighting seems especially poignant in view of the unmistakable race dynamics.

            A day of reckoning may be coming for pro football--and those of us who watch it.

John Gehring is the Media Director and Senior Writer for Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good

As an urbanite fortunate to live within walking distance of work and trendy restaurants, I rarely drive these days. But running late to a pickup basketball game recently, I was low on gas and quickly pulled into the first station on the road. It wasn't until my tank was nearly full that I looked up and saw a glowing CHEVRON sign. My stomach sank. Last Friday, I attended the premier of "Crude," a powerful documentary that chronicles the 16-year lawsuit waged against the oil company on behalf of nearly 30,000 indigenous people living in the rainforests of Ecuador.

The lawsuit alleges that Texaco (bought by Chevron in 2001) dumped more than 18 billion gallons of toxic waste into the Amazon from 1964 to 1990. Plaintiffs for the indigenous tribes believe the ecological disaster poisoned an area the size of Rhode Island and is at least 30 times larger than the Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska. The once pristine waters that nourished generations of indigenous communities now run black with oil. Infants are born with birth defects, cancer is ravaging villages, and a way of life dating back 500 years has been destroyed. Chevron executives deny responsibility and have used deep pockets to drag out the case. The company, based in San Ramon, Calif., recently reported profits of $3.8 billion and has no shortage of savvy PR consultants or expensive legal minds at their disposal. The non-profit Amazon Watch is leading a coalition of international groups demanding accountability from the oil giant. Rep. James McGovern of Massachusetts, who attended the premier in Washington, DC, visited the affected areas of Ecuador last year and in a letter to President Obama described what he saw as a "terrible humanitarian and environmental crisis" that as an American left him "angry and ashamed." 

The film raises haunting questions for those of us privileged to live in comfort while others suffer from the greed of U.S. corporations. How do we reconcile our call as Christians to live simply and seek justice for the most vulnerable amid a culture of excessive consumerism? How do we avoid becoming indifferent to human rights abuses far from our daily experiences? "Crude" shakes us out of the cocoon of complacency. It forces us to consider how personal choices relate to systemic injustices.

I grew up steeped in the intricate vocabulary of sin. In classes that should have been called Catholic Guilt 101, I learned about mortal sins, venal sins, sins of omission and sins of commission from the good sisters at Immaculate Conception Elementary School. It was also a sin, I was sorry to hear, not to confess all my sins during confession. I suspect most of us still think about sin as personal slights and wrongdoing against another individual. Christian conservatives are particularly fond of railing against sexual sins and could barely contain themselves when Bill Clinton got into trouble in the Oval Office. But we hear much less indignation about "social sins" that include environmental exploitation or the humanitarian impact of war. Consider the potential for progress on some of our most urgent moral challenges if we could channel some of the anger fanning the flames of our ubiquitous "culture wars" into campaigns against global poverty, preventable diseases and ecological disasters.    

While some elected officials like Sen. James Inhofe of Oklahoma still deny the reality of global climate change and lobbyists for Big Oil engage in what amounts to legalized bribery on Capitol Hill, I'm proud that Christians are on the front lines of a growing movement for environmental justice and corporate accountability. Sister Patricia Daly and her fellow Dominican sisters of Caldwell, N.J. challenge companies like Exxon Mobile, Dow and General Electric at shareholder meetings. The Catholic sisters are part of the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility, an association of 275 faith-based institutional investors that press companies to be socially and environmentally responsible. Each year religious institutional investors sponsor over 200 shareholder resolutions. Pope Benedict XIV has been dubbed the Green Pope for his resolute commitment to environmental justice. The Vatican even became the first "carbon neutral" state in the world. The pope's latest encyclical addressed the need for sustainable development, and the responsibility wealthy nations have to help developing countries escape the deadly traps of debt and poverty. Last spring, the Catholic Coalition Against Climate Change launched A Catholic Climate Covenant: the St. Francis Pledge to Care for Creation and the Poor. As Christians, we recognize that ending the poisoning of our planet is a pro-life issue central to defending human dignity.

Colonialism, in the official sense, is the shameful legacy of a bygone era. But multinational corporations that plunder and exploit the rainforests of South America or the mines of Africa continue this brutal cycle with tragic consequences. If those of us who know the truth fail to speak out, we stand complicit in our silence.