Creation Corner Column, May 2020
Earth Day Reflections, Books on the Pandemic and Climate
Change, June event, Anniversaries.
Change, June event, Anniversaries.
Religious Earth Day Reflections
1. Climate Justice Ministries emphasized the theme "Fierce Urgency of Now". climatejustice.org
2. Green Faith's "The Call for Climate Action" provided a "Climate in the Pulpit" Pledge (to elevate climate action as a moral, religious and justice issue), and provided many "Earth Day Live" videos. See GreenFaith.org
3. Eco-Justice Ministries provided pre-Earth Day commentary and links. eco-justice.org .
4. The PA-based Evangelical Environmental Network (EEN) urged speaking out to elected leaders about creation care in their ministry that educates, inspires, and mobilizes Christians in their effort to care for creation. creationcare.org
5. LetAllCreationPraise.org urged a Faith Action Climate Week: theme of "Love Made Visible" as an interfaith Sunday celebration for "sacred activism" to achieve creation stewardship. Many links here, for example, to various denominations.
6. A collaborative effort of Parliament of World Religions, EarthDay.org , 50YearsEarthDay2020, and the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)/FaithforEarth initiative, included a 50th Earth Day observance with global inter-faith religious and indigenous leaders. A Catholic-Buddhist dialogue webinar was included.
7. A 2020 Faith Climate Action Kit is available from Interfaith Power and Light.
Secular Earth Day 2020 Reflections
1. The United States Postal Service (USPS) issued an "Earth Day Forever" first-class postage stamp.
2. The "official site" of Earth Day.org had "Climate Action" as its theme with digital conversation events (due to the global pandemic restrictions on public gatherings).
3. Earth Day Live 2020.org had a three-day event with hundreds of participants with live-streamed videos shown. It was coordinated by the US Climate Strike Coalition and the Stop the Money Pipeline, that together are made up of over 500 organizations. The Stop the Money Pipeline refers to the Bill McKibben assisted effort to curtail investments in the fossil fuel companies.
4. Parade Magazine, nationally circulated, issued a cover story for Earth Day, Sunday April 19, 2020. It provided:
a. Planet-friendly tips from Al Roker, who helps to lead the NBC new Climate Unit, includes some suggestions for having on-the-go-smarts; BYOF (bring-your-own-fork); ditching the plastic bottle; leftover food wraps; sustainable sneakers; soap solutions; sip-smart-straws.
b. Examples of "Celebrities Going Green" include Leonardo Cicaprio whose foundation is now part of the Earth Alliance, Gisele Bundchen the supermodel named Best Green International Celebrity of the Year at London's 2011 Green Awards; environmental activist/actor Mark Ruffalo; Robert Redford with the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC); Sting and wife Trudie Styler co-founded the Rainforest Foundation in 1988; and Bette Midler who founded the New York Restoration Project in 1995 to revitalize community gardens and thus improve the natural balance of life in NYC.
c. "50 Ideas From 50 States" for Earth Day include too many to mention here. Some highlights of resources to access include:
#WednesdaysForWater Twitter hashtag (Flint MI)
audubon.org (helping birds)
energy.gov (electric cars)
earthday.org (single-use plastic bans)
greentreeplastics.com
wildbook.org (Illinois bats endangered)
fws.gov/endangered (endangered species)
renewalworkshop.com (Oregon clothing recycling)
glavel.com (glass + gravel)
glassrecyclingfoundation.org
usatla.org (toy libraries)
greencirclesalons.com (earth-friendly salons)
arborday.org (tree planting)
pollinator-pathway.org (CT planting for pollinators)
nurdlepatrol.org (TX plastic pellets watchdog)
natgeophotoark.org (many species photo archive)
beckerhospitalreview.com (green hospitals)
Overviews of this Parade Earth Day issue:
Parade.com/earthday for complete 50 states ideas for Earth Day's 50th anniversary
Parade.com.roker (Al Roker advice)
Parade.com/copeny (donate to Flint MI clean drinking water effort)
5. Ocean Conservancy provides re-usable straws with annual membership renewal. Also provided is a "Take 5 for Turtles" small poster suggesting ways to help endangered turtles. OceanConsevancy.org
6. The "Solutions" newsletter for Spring 2020 from the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) included a one-page article "Five ways to break you plastic habit/Start using less plastic, today" with tips including where to start; food shopping and storage; personal care and cleaning products; buying less and buying it secondhand; and growing your impact. The article is by Lexi Krupp, who I assume is related to the EDF President, Fred Krupp. Two book suggestions are:
Inconspicuous Consumption: The Environmental Impact You Don't Know You Have, by Tatiana Schlossberg.
Green Gone Wrong: How Our Economy is Undermining the Environmental Revolution, by Heather Rogers.
7. "Graying Green: Climate Action for an Aging World" web site is one man's effort to "connect the dots". Dr. Michael "Mick" Smyer, of Lewisburg PA-based Bucknell University's Psychology Department offers some Earth Day advice and links it to the Covid-19 crisis. Dr. Smyer has been a presenter at the ten-year old Bucknell.edu/LifeLongLearning institute for community retirees and others. Also see grayinggreen.org .
8. A "Green Good Housekeeping Seal" of approval is issued by the Good Housekeeping magazine's Institute as an emblem of sustainability for products that have met a wide range of environmental criteria. ghsealcom . This will not be news to long-time readers of GH.
Pandemic Resources
The Beautiful Cure: The Revolution in Immunology and What It Means for Your Health. Daniel M. Davis.
Big Farms Make Big Flu: Dispatches on Infectious Disease, Agribusiness, and the Nature of Science. Rob Wallace.
Clear-Cutting Disease Control: Capital-Led Deforestation, Public Health Austerity, and Vector-Borne Infection. Rodrick Wallace et al.
The Coming Plague: Newly Emerging Diseases in a World Out of Balance. Laurie Garrett.
Contagion and the State in Europe, 1830-1930. Peter Baldwin.
Darwinian Agriculture: How Understanding Evolution Can Improve Agriculture. R. Ford Denison.
Deadliest Enemy: Our War Against Killer Germs. Michael Osterholm.
Ecological Imperialism: The Biological Expansion of Europe, 900-1900 (2nd edition). Alfred W. Crosby.
The Ecology of Agrosystems. John H. Vandermeer.
Epidemics: The Impact of Germs and Their Power Over Humanity. Joshua S. Loomis
Epidemics and Society: From the Black Death to the Present. Frank M. Snowden.
The Great Influenza: The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History (1918). John M. Barry.
Influenza and Public Health: Learning from Past Pandemics. Edited by Jennifer Gunn, Tamara Giles-Vernick and Susan Craddock.
The Monster at Our Door: The Global Threat of Avian Flu. Mike Davis.
Neoliberal Ebola: Modeling Disease Emergence from Finance to Forest and Farm. Robert G. Wallace and Rodrick Wallace, eds.
Planet of Slums. Mike Davis.
Political Ecology of Agriculture: Agroecology and Post-Development. Omar Felipe Giraldo.
The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity., Toby Ord.
The Routledge Handbook of Biosecurity and Invasive Species. Edited by Juliet Fall, Robert Francis, Martin A. Schlaepfer, and Kezia Barker (forthcoming).
The Rules of Contagion: Why Things Spread and Why They Stop.. Adam Kucharski.
Books on Climate Change
All Hell Breaking Loose: The Pentagon's Perspective on Climate Change. Michael T. Klare.
Being the Change: Live Well and Spark a Climate Revolution. Peter Kalmus.
The Earth is Not for Sale: A Path out of Fossil Capitalism to the Other World that is Still Possible. David and Peter Schwartzman.
Ecological Politics: For Survival and Democracy. John Rensenbrink.
The End of Ice: Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption. Dahr Jamail.
The Future We Choose: Surviving the Climate Crisis. Christina Figures and Tom Rivett-Carnac, co-authors.
Here: Poems for the Planet. Elizabeth J. Coleman, ed., foreword by the Dalai Lama.
The Hindu Kush Himalaya Assessment: Mountains, Climate Change, Sustainability and People. International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development. link.springer.com .
The Ice at the End of the World: An Epic Journey into Greenland's Buried Past and Our Perilous Future. Jon Gertner.
Industrial-Strength Denial: Eight Stories of Corporations Defending the Indefensible, From the Slave Trade to Climate Change. Barbara Freese.
Inhabitance: Ecological Religious Education. Jennifer R. Ayres.
IPPC Special Report on the Ocean and Cryosphere in a Changing Climate. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. available at ipcc.ch .
The Long Thaw: How Humans Are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth's Climate. David Archer.
The Political Economy of Global Warming: The Terminal Crisis. Del Watson.
Powering Empire: How Coal Made the Middle East and Sparked Global Carbonization. On Barak.
The Water Will Come: Rising Seas, Sinking Cities, and the Remaking of the Civilized World. Jeff Goodell.
UPCOMING EVENT
World Environment Day, Friday June 5, theme is "Celebrating Biodiversity."
Topics to be explored include
the role of coral reefs in sustaining all life on earth
climate emergencies and biodiversity
ecosystem restoration
poverty and wildlife
See especially the site on "Six Nature Facts Related To Coronaviruses." 60% of all infectious diseases in humans are zoonotic, as are 75% of all emerging infectious diseases. In other words, they come to us via animals. Examples include MERS, SARS, EBOLA, COVID-19, Avian flu, etc.
An Environmental Sabbath is to be encouraged to be held June 7, the Sunday closest to June 5.
worldenvironmentday.global
Anniversaries
30th Anniversary of CERES,
The Coalition for Environmentally Responsible EconomieS has:
... launched the Corporate Electric Vehicle Alliance to help reduce climate pollution inasmuch as transportation is the largest source of GHG emissions in the U.S. Nearly 1.5 million EVs are on U.S. roads today, just under 2% of all vehicles on the road.
...met with some success in getting corporations and investors to join in taking action to take science-based climate action. Members of the Ceres BICEP (Business for Innovative Climate and Energy Policy) Network include 827 companies pledging to align their practices with aggressive climate targets.
...with its Ceres Investor Network joined the Climate Action 100+ (CA100+), an investor led initiative challenging the world's biggest polluters to act on climate change.
...made progress with investors and corporations in reducing the risk associated with Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) issues in global supply chains (for example, food), especially as regards deforestation and illegal fishing.
...participated in the AgWater Challenge to help food and beverage companies reduce their impacts on water resources. Animal agriculture is linked to nearly 15% of global GHG emissions and is a significant driver of both water scarcity and land-use change, including deforestation.
...joined with FAIRR (Farm Animal Investment Risk and Return) in launching a global investor coalition representing more than $6.5 trillion in assets calling on six of the world's largest fast food companies to set aggressive targets to reduce their GHG emissions and the water impacts of their meat and dairy supply chains.
Ten year anniversary since the 2001-2010 International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Nonviolence for the Children of the World, sponsored by the United Nations.
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Mike Ochs finds common ground between religion and politics in his concern for the environment.
Politically he self-published the first "Greens Bibliography" of the English-language literature on the international Green Party movement (1989), the project for his Master of Liberal Arts in International Studies degree at Lock Haven (PA) University. He also helped plant the seeds for the Green Party of PA at that time, and remains a cyber-activist with it.
For a monthly newsletter of the ecumenical United Churches of Lycoming County (PA), he has written the "Creation Corner Column" since 1997. It became a blog in 2011 at
He received a B.A. degree from Gettysburg College in 1965.
