Creation Corner Column for August 2020
Pandemic & Climate Issue, and General Reading
Pandemic Issues
"Coronavirus infections require what Japan calls the three Cs: confined spaces, crowded places, and close contact." (source: Heather Mac Donald's article in the May/June 2020 issue of Imprimis: a publication of Hillsdale College).
The three Ws advice for avoiding the virus: Wear a mask, wash your hands, watch your distance.
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Oxfam America is calling for "The People's Vaccine: Available to All, In every country, free of charge." Their petition reads as follows:
"To deliver a COVID-19 vaccine to all will require unprecedented global cooperation. That means ripping up the rule book that gives exclusive rights to pharmaceutical corporations and guarantees their huge profits. I am joining in the public outcry calling on US pharmaceutical companies to make all COVID-19 vaccines and treatments a global public good by:
...Committing not to profit from the COVID-19 pandemic.
...Cooperating with governments to make all COVID-19 vaccines and treatments free to all who need them, here and around the world.
...Forgoing monopoly control over all COVID-19 vaccines and treatments to allow for worldwide, low-cost production to meet the unprecedented demand.
...Committing to support fair global distribution based on need, not price or nationality.
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Books re: the Pandemic (also see prior monthly columns)
Pandemic: Tracking Contagions From Cholera to Ebola and Beyond. Sonia Shah.
The Pull of the Stars. Emma Donoghue (novel of the flu epidemic of 1918).
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Connecting the World Virus Pandemic to the Planetary Climate Crisis
"The current moment is demonstrating just how far away we are from being able to come together to solve a planetary crisis. The pandemic is a test, and we're failing it. If the federal government reacts to the greatest public health crisis in a century with half measures, what could possibly convince it to react sufficiently to climate change? If governors won't demand their citizens wear masks to save lives, will they be willing to get people to reduce their carbon footprints? If so many authoritarian and authoritarian-adjacent governments react to a pandemic with denial, what can we expect as the climate crisis worsens?" Harry Cheadle in NewRepublic.com, reprinted as "Viewpoint" in The Week magazine of July 10/July 17, 2020, p. 14.
Recommended Reading re: Climate Crisis
1. "One Last Chance: The Defining Year for the Planet" double issue cover story of TIME magazine, July 20, July 27, 2020.
Features include
This is the year, by Justin Worland
America's four-year plan, by Jeffrey Kluger
How to Save the Oceans, by Aryn Baker
Q & A with activist Vanessa Nakate, by Angelina Jolie
XR ("Extinction Rebellion") comes of age, by Ciara Nugent
Equalizing the environment, by Justin Worland
The meat trap, by Emily Barone
The Paris plan, by Vivienne Walt
and Viewpoints by
Asmeret Asefaw Berhe
Stacey Abrams
Mark Ruffalo and Rahwa Ghirmatzion
Sebastian Kurz
Greta Thunberg
Ayana Elizabeth Johnson
The Dalai Lama
Oliver Jeffers
2. Blll McKibben's book review of Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency by Mark Lynas, may be found as "130 Degrees" in The New York Review of Books for August 20, 2020, pgs. 8 and 10.
3. Elizabeth Kolbert's article profiling James Hansen, entitled "The Catastrophist: A climate expert's unheeded warnings" in The New Yorker of July 27, special "Voices of American Dissent: An Archival Issue", reprinted from June 29, 2009.
4. "Care for Creation" is the cover story theme of the August 2020 issue of Living Lutheran magazine. Eight articles include
"A call to heal creation" lead piece of 5 pages.
"Congregations go green."
"A sustainable campus."
"Stewards of creation:family farm sustainability."
"An innovative approach: Climate commitment fund bolsters ELCA World Hunger."
"The spirituality of natural burials."
"A most precious resource" re: water in Senegal.
"Highly recommended" books on creation care.
Global Weirding Books (see former monthly columns for more).
Lead for the Planet: Five Practices for Confronting Climate Change. Rae Andre. (forthcoming),
Our Final Warning: Six Degrees of Climate Emergency. Mark Lynas (2020).
Six Degrees: Our Future on a Hotter Planet. Mark Lynas (2007).
Books on Nuclear Environmental Holocaust, on occasion of the 75th anniversary of August 6-9, 1945, Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
See the four books reviewed by Jessica T. Mathews article "The New Nuclear Threat" in The New York Review of Books for August 20, 2020, pgs. 19-21. (Note bottom line: "A nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.")
General Reading
50 Things to See in the Sky. Sarah Barker.
100 Parks, 5000 Ideas. Joe Yogerst.
America's Best Day Hikes. Derek Dellinger.
The Animal's Companion: People and Their Pets, a 26,000-Year Love Story. Jacky Collis Harvey.
Around the World in 80 Trees. Jonathan Drori; illustrated by Lucille Clerc.
Atlas Obscura: Second Edition. Joshua Foer, Dylan Thuras, and Ella Morton.
Audubon's Birds of America Giant Coloring Book.
Birdsong for the Curious Naturalist: Your Guide to Listening. Donald Kroodsma. With links to to audio clips.
Bird Songs: 250 North American birds in song. Les Beletsky. Includes audio recording of each.
A Cloud a Day. Gavin Pretor-Pinney.
Greenwood: A Novel. Michael Christie (forthcoming re: environmental stewardship).
Feeding the People: The Politics of the Potato. Rebecca Earle.
Flora: A Botanical Pop-Up Book. Nicole Yen et al. For ages 5 and up.
The Hidden World of the Fox. Adele Brand.
Indoor Jungle: The Leaf Supply Guide to Creating Your Indoor Jungle. Lauren Camilleri and Sophia Kaplan.
Inside Animal Hearts and Minds. Belinda Recio.
The Little Books of Bird Songs. Andrea Pinnington and Caz Buckingham (with 12 push-button audio recordings---choose Backyard or Woodland Bird Songs). For children and their families.
The Meaning of Birds. Simon Barnes.
Natural: How Faith in Nature's Goodness Leads to Harmful Fads, Unjust Laws, and Flawed Science. Alan Levinovitz (a professor of religion).
A Nature Poem for Every Day of the Year. edited by Jane McMorland Hunter.
Never Home Alone: From Microbes to Millipedes, Camel Crickets, and Honeybees, the Natural History of Where We Live. Rob dunn.
Our Dogs, Ourselves: The Story of a Singular Bond. Alexandra Horowitz.
Poems About Trees. Edited by Harry Thomas.
Scenic Science of the National Parks. Emily Hoff and Maygen Keller.
Superlative: The Biology of Extremes. Matthew D. LaPlante.
Vintage Wildflowers Puzzle.
Where in the World? Global Dream Destinations. Edited by Monaco Books.
A Wild Child's Guide to Endangered Animals. Millie Marotta. For ages 8 and up.
Wonders of the World. By the editors of Lonely Planet.
Quotations
"Adopt the pace of nature. Her secret is patience." Ralph Waldo Emerson.
"A truly good book is something as natural, and as unexpectedly and unaccountably fair and perfect, as a wild flower." Henry David Thoreau.
"One tree is like another tree, but not too much. One tulip is like the next tulip, but not altogether. More or less like people---a general outline, then the stunning individual strokes." Mary Oliver, from her book Upstream:Selected Essays.
"It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save the environment." Ansel Adams
"The sky isn't the limit---the sky has no limit."
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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
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