Ecological legalism and Christian freedom

Some questions: What is your carbon footprint? How does it compare to the global average? To the global required average? And what are you doing to reduce it?

Dig beneath the surface of ecological issues and for many people, apart from fear, the second most significant factor driving our responses is guilt. So much of the discourse around ecological responsibility has the feel of a new legalism, a set of norms available to external quantification and verification that can at best provide useful guidance and at worst either crush motivation or provide an open door to self-righteous superiority (depending on the size of one's footprint). Indeed, the whole concept of an ecological or carbon footprint is ripe for interpersonal comparison and when linked to moral judgements of the necessity of reducing it, the full range of contemporary ecological psychoses becomes manifest: holier-than-thou accusation, desperate performance, pious self-denigration, tokenistic conformity, resentful rejection, weary indifference, paralysing despair.

If we are nonetheless to take our ecological concerns seriously (as the scriptures, reason and a passing familiarity with our present condition suggest), then do we have to live with such legalism? Of course not.

Basically, we need a way to talk about the good life to which Christ calls us that speaks in the tones of grace not law (apart from the law of love). This good life may well often look like taking up a cross and denying myself, but I walk it in hope and faith that the path of love is ultimately the path of life, even if I have to wait for God to raise the dead to see it.

We are set free by Christ to live as servants of God and neighbour. This is the only path to life, and at times it can feel narrow, and yet the content is actually quite flexible. Andrew Cameron speaks of the ethical life as being like a river - there is a strong current in one direction (love), but within that, there is water moving in all kinds of ways, at different speeds and so on. Yet there are still river banks. This is his attempt to speak of how the scriptures can be quite specific in their prohibitions ("do not lie"), but general in their exhortations ("love your neighbour").

The question for us as Christians seeking to follow Christ amidst a world of ecological degradation is therefore: what is the space of Christian ecological freedom? Where are there hard lines that we ought not cross? And, much more importantly, how do we talk about (and live) the strong current of love? Complicating matters is the fact that many aspects of our ecological crises are cumulative, involving too much of an otherwise good thing, rather than the commission of acts that are in themselves always wrong. In this way, I think that ecological irresponsibility has a somewhat similar structure to drunkenness, or gluttony. I may know that once I have had ten drinks, then I am in disobedience to the warnings of scripture against inebriation, but there is not necessarily a line we can draw in the sand and say that up to this many drinks is I am simply enjoying the fruit of the vine. Perhaps legal blood alcohol limits for driving might give us a ballpark estimate, and perhaps contraction and convergence models of carbon reductions (applied on a per capita basis for our nation) might give us a ballpark estimate for our the path of our personal carbon footprint goals, but the law of the land is always going to be both too precise and too blunt an instrument for forming the mind of Christ within us.

If our goal is defined too narrowly in terms of certain emissions levels or atmospheric concentrations or personal footprints, then the complex world of goods and the discernment required to navigate it can become oversimplified. Even amidst the grave perils we face, Christian obedience is a path of freedom and joy, of trusting the goodness of God under the weight of a cross, of dying to self and receiving new life being granted as a gift.

Some better questions: How does new life in Christ lead into delightedly sharing my neighbour's burdens? In what ways are my neighbours threatened by ecological degradation? Which parts of my life and the life of my community contribute to this path of destruction? How can I discover new patterns of thankfulness, contentment and engagement to express the abiding peace I have received from Christ and the deep concern for my neighbour this grants me?

Joined up life - the blog

Andrew Cameron, whose recent book I reviewed back here, has now started a blog to continue to reflect on how we navigate our way through life.

What is wrong with growth?

"All these problems seem to be getting bigger rather than smaller every year and for every single one of them there are hosts of organisations clamouring for attention and offering solutions to the problem. But the more I read and think about the problems as a whole, the more I become convinced that they were all in fact symptoms and not causes in themselves. Trying to remedy a symptom is almost always useless if the root cause is ignored. Obiously all the problems have to do with human activities, and these activities have to do with the context they are taking place in, the economic context to be precise. This economic context is determined by the dominant economic concept, and in our case I think it is safe to say that for many decades now the neoclassical economic concept of infinite growth has been shaping the economies of developed nations."

- Neven, Infinite Growth and the Crisis Cocktail.

What is wrong with growth?

Nothing, until it doesn't stop. Then it is cancer.

On Michael Tobis' blog, Neven has written a thought-provoking guest post summarising many of the ecological and resource crises I've been talking about and drawing the links to distorted ideologies of (endless economic) growth.

The (quite long) discussion in the comments is also valuable.

At greater length and from a Christian point of view on the same topic, Andrew Cameron has written an excellent piece called Is Growth Good? which I recommend even more highly. Don't believe the bankers, CEOs, politicians and pundits: there are things better than growth and it is possible to discover more by joyfully embracing less.

Joined-up Life: A Christian account of how ethics works

"[Jesus] wreaked the best kind of havoc wherever he went. He upset everyone’s moral categories all the time. To the law-stickler he said, go and discover some compassion (Luke 14.3-5). To the equal-rights activist he said, challenge your inner greed (Luke 12.13-15). To those who valued self-fulfillment he said, learn some faithfulness (Matthew 19.3-6); and to the seeker after self-improvement he said, learn from kindness (Matthew 19.16-21). To the goal-oriented security-seeker he said, lose yourself in Gods abundant creation (Luke 12. 22-34). To those wanting righteous judgement on others he said, stop it (Luke 9.52-55). To evaders of righteous judgement he said, wake up (Luke 13.1-4). For those deserving righteous judgement he prayed, forgive them (Luke 23.34).

"He upset moral categories everywhere, yet he inhabited the most joined-up life imaginable. So Christians orient themselves to he cosmos ‘in him’. Anything less – any adherence to some other code, set of values, consequences, principle or philosophy – would relegate Jesus merely to becoming a fellow traveller within that code or philosophy. That would be a horrendous error, because we would then miss all the signals that he’s the human who knew how to be human. We would miss the opportunity for him to induct us into true humanity."

- Andrew Cameron, Joined-up Life: A Christian account of how ethics works
(Nottingham: IVP, 2011), 315.

Having recently got my hands on a copy of Andrew Cameron’s new book, I have rediscovered in its pages many of the reasons why I found him to be an insightful, careful, refreshing and stimulating teacher at college.

This text is a very useful and readable introduction to what is usually called ethics (though perhaps can simply be called "navigating life"): what it is, how it works, how it has been approached in the past and what Jesus has to do with it. The book is divided in forty-seven bite-sized chapters that can stand alone for those who wish to dip in, or which can also be read consecutively in a picture that gradually comes together.

These chapters are grouped into seven sections. In the first, Cameron walks us through basic ethical approaches, which he summarises as rules, rights, values and results. Each has something to contribute, but each fails to provide a comprehensive framework for finding our way in life.

The second section explores a number of ways in which our moral map is more complex than it may at first appear; our social context, our own desires, human frailty and the complexity of a world filled with myriad good things combine to refuse easy answers. Ethics is not obvious and we need help if we are not to get lost amidst it all.

The third section turns to the centre that holds together and surpasses rules, rights, values and results: the human life of Jesus. Tracing his story, Cameron argues that here we find a life that hangs together, a cohesive and compelling life, a joined-up life amidst the complexity and fragmentation of our world. This doesn't mean easy answers, but it does give a central point of reference to all our ethical thinking and practice.

Fourth comes five fundamental poles of reference to guide us amidst the intricacy and confusion: the character of God, created order, divine commands, Christian hope and community shaped by Jesus. None are sufficient, but each contributes to our navigation through life's twists and turns.

The final three sections turn again to the specifics of our lives, illustrating and applying the theological orientation developed in sections three and four to the complex situations outlined in section two. Since I have only dipped into these sections so far, I won't attempt to say much more about them here.

The great strength of this book is precisely its refusal to discover or establish a single unifying framework or concept by which to live our lives other than the person of Jesus and his life. The irreducible complexity of the moral challenges we face (and this doesn't just mean the familiar "hard cases" trotted out in every introductory ethics course but also them variegated patterns and texture of daily life) elude analysis based on a single interpretive key. Jesus is what holds it together, but this doesn't require the reduction of every problem, question or opportunity for action to a predetermined framework.

Readers may find points of disagreement with Cameron's suggested applications and expeditions into the jungle of life, though also hidden treasures. And disagreement itself becomes less threatening when we acknowledge the sheer breadth of goods we are trying to keep our eyes on.

Honest and humble in tone, this book invites us to face the reality of our inability to find a perfect path through our days. We are not given a map with a birds-eye view, simply a companion to share the journey.

Keep on blowing up the pokies

Andrew Cameron and Rebecca Belzer have put together another excellent piece of research and commentary on an Australian social issue. This one is about the reform of gambling laws relating to poker machines, a topic I discussed briefly back here.

There is a more recent briefing offering some reflections upon the killing of Osama bin Laden through a just war lens, though it is not yet available on the website. I'll update this post with a link when it is. now available here.

These Social Issues Briefings come out at (semi-)regular intervals. Each is two or three pages of well-researched information and Christian analysis of a topical Australian social issue with links to further information. The back catalogue is here and you can sign up to the email list here.

Andrew has recently published a book called Joined-up Life: a Christian account of how ethics works, which I highly recommend. I am intending to post a brief review sometime in the next few days when I get a chance.

Working hard?

Andrew Cameron, my former ethics lecturer, recently gave a talk at the Centre for Christian Living on a Christian ethical analysis of work. Worth a listen if you happen to work or know someone who does.

More on euthanasia

I recently offered some comments on an article on euthanasia in the SMH by Andrew Cameron. Andrew has also written this piece on the topic for the Social Issues Briefing which I think takes a more fruitful approach through the lens of fear; euthanasia is a failed attempt to deal with our fears surrounding death and dying.

Discussing euthanasia in Australia

"[Euthanasia] is a case where the Bible's prohibition of killing innocent humans is a no-brainer, even if we agree about little else. For this prohibition generates a community that upholds and cares for others at their weakest and most vulnerable. The prohibition against deliberate killing of innocent human life is what impels us to research and practise good palliative care. It enables trust within patient-carer and patient-relative relationships. It frees the ill person from constantly having to interrogate the hidden motives of those around them, and allows them to accept their care without shame. It says to all of us that, burden or not, we can stop being productive, and allow others to help us."

- Andrew Cameron, "Euthanasia question needs wider debate", SMH 8th October 2010.

Michael Jensen also recently had a piece on popular Australian current issues site The Punch, in which he tried an imaginative and emotive approach to the question (and received responses that were correspondingly even more heated).

I agree that legislation ought not be done by poll, that more discussion about the effects of legalising euthanasia on the community of trust and care is important and that we need careful and compassionate discussion that takes good note of the overlaps and distinctions between suicide, medically assisted suicide, withdrawal of treatment, and palliative care (rather than the simplistic: euthanasia, yes or no?). I also agree that even the most carefully constructed legal safeguards may not entirely prevent abuse and destructive forms of psychological pressure, shifting the boundaries between care and burden in undesirable ways.

Yet are current proposals about euthanasia (namely, the overturning of the federal of the 1995 Northern Territory legislation) really a "no-brainer" case of killing innocent humans? There may be cases of abuse in which this is so. The re-activating of the legislation may lead to "a creeping expansion of candidates for euthanasia". But for a patient voluntarily (and without emotional pressure) to take his or her own life with assistance from another would seem to fall under a discussion of suicide more than murder, making the attribution of innocence to the victim problematic, and the situation considerably more complex.

There may well be other good reasons for considering deliberate suicide (with or without assistance) to be in some sense a failure to cherish the gift of life, or an expression of despair within a broken and hurting world, but I think that the debate about this matter is necessarily knotty since the possible and actual situations themselves are morally complex. I do not support the legalising of euthanasia, but I don't think that the discussion is a no brainer.

Personally, I wonder whether the notions of choice and autonomy that frequently underlie the case for euthanasia are worth exploring and critiquing in greater detail. Is a world based on each of us deciding "what is best for me" really the world that is best for all of us?

On blessing enemies and burning books

I recently mentioned the plans of a small church in Florida to commemorate the attacks of 11th September 2001 by burning a Qur'an, in order to send a warning to radical Islam: "If you attack us, if you attack us, we will attack you." This is the heart of the rationale offered by Pastor Terry Jones, who plans to carry out this act on Saturday's anniversary.

In my previous post I mentioned the words of Christ in Luke 6 about loving enemies as one obvious response to this proposal. Loving enemies means the only retaliation we can condone is repaying cursing with blessing, hatred with love, and violence with vulnerable peacemaking. God retaliated against the death of his son by raising him to new life, and by commissioning messengers with the gospel of forgiveness and peace in his name. Burning a book is indeed a powerful form of communication, but the message that is intended by this action is a perversion of the gospel of Christ.

Indeed, there is a deeper and even more worrying assumption behind this action, which is brought to light by asking after the identity of the "we" in Pastor Jones' quote above. Who is it who will bring repay attack for attack? The obvious candidate is the US military acting on behalf of the US government. As well as ignoring the teaching of our Lord, this pastor seems to have confused the church of Jesus Christ with his nation and its military.

Sam Norton has suggested that the popular reaction to this story has been misguided, on the basis that the offensiveness of burning a Qu'ran, or the potential harm it might bring to US soldiers are not properly Christian reasons. It is not the place of the church to ensure the safety of soldiers occupying a foreign country, nor is the giving of offence itself a problem. On these points, he is correct. He goes on to suggest that the burning could be seen as an act of protest or resistance against idolatry. I am not opposed to symbolic actions that expose the hollowness and violence of idolatry. But I don't think this action does that. Not only does Jones' explanation fail to conform to anything like the Christian gospel, but the very act of burning a book - not least the sacred text of a minority community in his society - does not speak of fearlessness, hope or joy. It is a punitive action that attempts to silence speech and intimidate a group already the focus of hostility and suspicion.

As one of Sam's commentators (revsimmy) points out, "In the only New Testament example of book-burning (Acts 19:19) at Ephesus these were books being burned by people who were renouncing their former beliefs and practices (not the case in Pastor Jones' case). Later on in Ephesus, when the silversmiths stir up a riot against Paul, the town clerk is able to claim, with apparent credibility, that Paul and his companions have never spoken against their temple or blasphemed their goddess." This too is an important point. Whatever we make of the book-burning in Acts chapter 19, it was undertaken voluntarily by those who had formerly practiced idolatry as a symbolic, costly and effective break with their old lives. The action planned by Terry Jones for this Saturday, by contrast, is more akin to the destruction of Buddhist statues by the Taliban. The overthrow of idolatry is not through the weapons of this world (whether explosives or cigarette lighters, outrage or censorship), but through preaching, purity and prayer.

The first idolatry that needs to be addressed in this story is not the attitude of Muslims to the Qu'ran, but of Christians to militarism and nationalism. The good news is that liberation from such empty idols is possible in Christ.

UPDATE: It seems that Pastor Jones may have decided to cancel the burning. Or put it on hold. Or something. He seems like quite a confused man.

A typically good reflection on the whole matter from Andrew Cameron in the Social Issues Briefing. He asks "what would St Paul do?" and his answer is that prior to the Damascus Road, Saul of Tarsus would have joined in and led the burning. After meeting Christ, not so much.

Keeping our feet on the ground

"For there is a sense in which the absence of oil only has one real effect. It will give back to us a proper sense of our creaturely limitation, as little embodied animals who can only walk a few kilometres a day. Our spatial limitations have always been what give us a sense of a ‘place’, or neighbourhood, in which we live. Oil has temporarily tricked us, making these constraints hidden in plain sight, deluding us into thinking that we can soar unencumbered like the angels just because someone can fly us to Phuket or because we can drive interstate. The absence of oil will only throw us back onto what was always the case, and what still remains the case for the majority of the world’s population: we are a people who dwell in neighbourhoods, villages and towns, making the best of interdependency with others in the same place. We cannot abstract away our createdness forever."

- Andrew Cameron, "The peak oil society".

Oil lets us fly. Good theology keeps our feet on the ground. More generally, the very spectacular success of our present industrial system has enabled the illusion of autonomy and independence. That this system is facing a series of dire threats from its own runaway achievements is an excellent chance to rediscover the goodness of our interdependence.

Dave recently reminded me of this piece by Andrew Cameron, written back in 2007 (I mentioned it back here). It is almost certainly the best thing I've read about peak oil, and indeed by extension probably the best short piece responding to all the various challenges we face. Read it.

Why I am pessimistic about Copenhagen

There is a great deal in the media about the United Nations Climate Change Conference 2009 which will meet in Copenhagen in just over two weeks. A number of people have asked me recently about my take on the matter. While I think that an international agreement of some kind is necessary to reduce global greenhouse gas levels (it won't happen simply by countries acting unilaterally on national interest), my expectations for Copenhagen are pretty low at the moment. Let me briefly outline some of my current perceptions.

• First, it is worth noting that an international treaty of this scale and complexity is a historical novelty. That doesn't mean it can't be done, but it does mean that we're in uncharted waters. I am certainly no expert on international law, but I am aware that the last decades have seen numerous innovations in this field. Yet any treaty that is developed will be something of an experiment, and one unable to be repeated.

• Second, there are deep divisions between the developed and developing world. This was quite predictable. The former have produced by far the lion's share of historical emissions and continue to be much higher per capita emitters than even the industrializing economies of China and India. And while responsibility is not equally shared, neither are consequences. The current effects of climate change are being felt most keenly in developing nations (perhaps Australia will be (or is) the first developed nation to be seriously affected through water shortages during more frequent and severe droughts). These divisions were visible at Kyoto and were part of the reason for the failure of that effort (when the US and other developed nations (e.g. Australia) refused to ratify the agreement that their own negotiators had reached. Despite ten more years of negotiation and massive progress in climate science, these deep divisions remain and were evident in the African bloc of 50 nations boycotting part of the most recent pre-Copenhagen negotiations in Barcelona. They did this due to a perception that the developed world was not really serious about making significant changes.

•Third, there are particular political difficulties associated with the United States. The US has been historically the largest greenhouse gas emitter and continues to be so if consumption of products made elsewhere is included (about a quarter of China's carbon footprint derives from the creation of products for Western markets). And yet for eight years during the Bush administration, it did all it could to stand in the way of any international progress on the issue, refusing to ratify Kyoto and suppressing the warnings of its own agencies. The Obama change-we-could-believe-in has revealed that the US Congress has little faith. There is basically zero chance of any US climate legislation being passed prior to Copenhagen and even when Congress does get around to addressing it, the issue has become increasingly partisan.* The significant Democrat majority in Congress provides no guarantees for Obama's agenda, as demonstrated in the heath care debate. The US is not the only nation to have internal political divisions over the issue, but some of the quirks of the US system ensure that legislation will have particular difficulty in being passed.
*It is quite refreshing to see that it is much less so here in the UK, where the Conservatives are in full support of Gordon Brown's aggressive stance and promising to not make this an election issue (which may be a political move to neutralise a perceived Labour advantage; the actual determination of a (likely) Cameron government to make this a high-priority issue remains to be seen). It is also quite partisan in Australia.

• Fourth, public opinion about climate change remains in some degree of flux (with the numbers who view it as a serious threat declining in at least the US, Australia and the UK). While elected representatives ought to make their own judgements based on wisdom and available evidence, rather than simply seeing which way the wind is blowing), it only seems to be increasingly true that too many politicians follow rather than lead public opinion. And public opinion in some countries seems to have shifted away from seeing climate change as a real and present danger for various reasons. First, the economic downturn is an immediate distraction from a long-term problem like climate change, and provides a convenient excuse for inaction until economic conditions are better. Second, there is a growing and highly successful misinformation campaign of climate change denial that is muddying the waters with outdated, pseudo-scientific and de-bunked claims (and not just about climatology). This is not to say that there are not plenty of bogus claims made by those who see climate change as a serious issue, but the noise-to-signal ratio on each side is not even close to being equivalent. Of course there is a difference between genuine scepticism and denialism. And of course we ought to weigh important claims that made upon our lives and are right to take most things reported by the media with a grain (or five) of salt. However, Andrew Cameron puts it well when he says, “Too little scepticism is gullible, but there comes a time when too much scepticism is a crippling disconnection from reality.” I intend to write more on this at some stage soon.

As crippling as these four point are, none is entirely insurmountable. Together, they combine to mean that negotiations at Copenhagen are unlikely to reach a binding treaty. Indeed, as a result of these and other obstacles, President Obama has recently stated the increasingly obvious: that Copenhagen will not deliver a legally binding deal. Despite all the momentum and build-up, the talks will now become just another stepping stone rather than a finish-line for climate negotiations. Will this matter? Is a bad deal worse than no deal? Will this cripple the possibility of a treaty or just delay it? All that remains to be seen.

However, I have three more reasons for remaining pessimistic that would still be true even if a miraculous 11th hour deal is reached in Copenhagen.

• Fifth, even the most ambitious targets on the table may well be too modest. There is currently around 387 parts per million of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere. The pre-industrial level was about 275 ppm. Twenty years ago, when the issue started to gain more widespread attention, 550 ppm was seen as an upper limit, but this was basically just a doubling of 275 and was not based on much evidence. The general consensus is currently to try to limit average warming to 2ºC (though even this would have significant negative effects) and most of the recent efforts have focused on stabilizing CO2 levels at 450 ppm as a means towards this (though it is difficult to be precise, it seems 450 ppm only gives about a 50% chance of staying below 2ºC warming). This is what is on the table at Copenhagen. Stabilizing levels at 450 ppm will be extremely difficult and will require massive shifts in economic patterns and expectations. The model proposed by Nicholas Stern in his Stern Report included "overshooting" 450 ppm to peak at 550 and come back down from there. However, more recent studies suggest that even 450 ppm may well lead to runaway warming as feedback effects gain pace and a number of scientists are now calling for a goal of 350 ppm.

• Sixth, I am not currently persuaded that the cap-and-trade market based system proposed as the mechanism driving emission reductions will actually work to reduce CO2 levels. From my limited understanding, a revenue-neutral carbon tax would be better and could also be the subject of international agreements. Solving ecological issues through extending the reach of market logic into more spheres of life seems a little like trying to put out a fire by pouring oil on it.

• Seventh, even if politicians fashion a binding agreement (whether in Copenhagen or some time next year) for 450 ppm, we are very unlikely to get there. The required changes are enormous, the momentum behind business as usual is too large. The economic assumptions of centuries (though note that they only arose during the period of modern industrialization) are too deeply entrenched. No leader is talking about anything other than economic growth as their primary goal. No leader is being honest about the fact that stabilizing levels at even 450 ppm would require massive changes on a scale similar to those experienced in Russia during the collapse of the Soviet Union (the only example in recent history of a nation dropping its emissions at anything like the rate required). Of course, that was (a) unplanned, (b) lasted only a few years rather than decades, and (c) was still not fast enough.

In summary, the Copenhagen conference is an attempt to reach a novel international agreement in a short time frame despite deep political divisions between and within nations and lagging public support, an agreement which may well be too little, too late, using the wrong mechanism and obscuring the true size of the challenge. So call me an optimist.

Nonetheless, politics is the art of the possible and I do not see the conference as either hopeless or useless. Nor, despite my pessimism, do I believe that such pessimism is self-fulfilling. But these points will have to wait for another day since this post is already way too long.

Copenhagen and Climate Change: hope and hopelessness

Tomorrow, in at least 177 countries, over 4,600 political actions (many of them involving hundreds or thousands of people) will be taken under a single banner. The banner? A number, three hundred and fifty, referring to 350 parts per million of carbon dioxide (and equivalents) in the atmosphere. This is the level many leading climate scientists (including the head of the IPCC) now say is required to minimise the likelihood of passing various climate tipping points that trigger positive feedback mechanisms virtually ensuring further destructive changes. The challenge? We're currently at about 390 ppm. Even the most rigorous goal for the Copenhagen negotiations stands at 450 ppm, on the assumption that this gives us a better than even chance of limiting average warming to 2ºC, widely quoted as a threshold beyond which the dangers multiply. But even an average warming of 2ºC will have enormous effects on many aspects of climate, not least precipitation patterns (and so agricultural yields) in some of the world's most food-stressed areas. To avoid this, the 350 campaign brings together a huge number of organisations, individuals, congregations and parties from nearly every country, calling for global leaders who will soon meet in Copenhagen (see clock in sidebar) to reach an agreement that is strong, equitable and grounded in the latest science. Today's Sydney Morning Herald includes this opinion piece by Archbishop Desmond Tutu explaining his support for the campaign.
H/T Matt Moffitt and Geoff Broughton for this link.

Personally (provided we are both over a cold that has been dogging us recently), Jessica and I will be going to one of the Edinburgh events tomorrow in order to add our voices and bodies in support of keeping this issue high on the agenda. You can find an event near you here.

However, political support for a strong deal seems to be waning. New polling shows that only 57% of Americans believe the climate is warming (compared to 77% in 2007) and only 36% accept that the human actions are primarily to blame. In Australia, 68% saw climate change as a threat to Australia's vital interests back in 2006, by last year that was still 66%, but is now only 52%.

With national leaders concerned about national interests, every country is out to minimise its costs, particularly since the primary dangers are decades away, well beyond the term of any of those responsible for current negotiations. Different approaches to sharing the burden are also evident between countries that have historically contributed most to emissions and those whose emissions are currently rising fastest.

And there is worse news. Even if leaders manage to agree in Copenhagen to limiting emissions to 450ppm, reaching some kind of compromise between developing and developed nations, then even the most optimistic assumptions about a best case scenario put the chances of actually sticking to anything like that as almost impossible. Clive Hamilton, one of Australia's best known public intellectuals and Professor of Public Ethics at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, a joint centre of the Australian National University, Charles Sturt University and the University of Melbourne, in a lecture delivered earlier this week, summarises the situation like this:

It is clear that limiting warming to 2ºC is beyond us; the question now is whether we can limit warming to 4ºC [to see what a 4ºC change might look like, see here, or here]. The conclusion that, even if we act promptly and resolutely, the world is on a path to reach 650 ppm and associated warming of 4°C is almost too frightening to accept. Yet that is the reluctant conclusion of the world’s leading climate scientists. Even with the most optimistic set of assumptions—the ending of deforestation, a halving of emissions associated with food production, global emissions peaking in 2020 and then falling by 3 per cent a year for a few decades—we have no chance of preventing emissions rising well above a number of critical tipping points that will spark uncontrollable climate change.

- Clive Hamilton, "Is it too late to prevent catastrophic climate change?"

The whole article is worth reading. In it, Hamilton argues that things are worse than we thought. Whereas until recently most policy makers assumed that we could limit change to less than 2ºC and that the effects of that change were "worrying but manageable", new research into the likely negative effects of even 2ºC warming and into the extreme (political, economic and social) difficulty of staying below the 450ppm barrier makes even the most aggressive suggestions currently on the table seem at once both beyond our reach and too little in any case.

So why bother at all? Why campaign for a basically impossible target? Why make the (sometimes painful) lifestyle, legislative and policy changes required to reduce our carbon footprint? If all our efforts will be too little, too late, why not "eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die"? A longer answer will probably take much of my thesis to articulate. An excellent 11-page answer by Andrew Cameron in his 2007 report to Sydney Anglican Synod on behalf of the Social Issues Executive can be found here.

But the short answer for an already over-lengthy blog post is found in the context of that famous quote ("eat, drink and be merry") in 1 Corinthians 15, namely the Christian hope of the resurrection of the body. The resurrection of Jesus is a promise and foretaste of the general resurrection of the dead: for as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive. The distinctively Christian hope of resurrection includes the belief that God has not given up on creation, nor on humanity, and that even our stupid self-destruction cannot ultimately thwart divine love. If God has not given up, neither can we. Our actions may or may not make a difference. Our society may or may not survive in anything like its present form, but living well, with humility and repentance as responsible members of the community of life, is enough.

Australian charter of rights

The Australian Government is considering introducing a charter of rights. While it may initially sound like a great idea, on further reflection, I have more than a few reservations. Some of them are expressed by former NSW premier Bob Carr in this SMH article. And some others are expressed (at greater length) by Andrew Cameron in this excellent submission to the Freedom of Religion and Belief Project earlier this year. Although the latter is primarily in relation to religious freedoms and potential anti-vilification laws, many of the principles also apply in relation to a possible charter of rights.

Scarcity is not the problem

"The conflict between the narratives of abundance and of scarcity is the defining problem confronting us at the turn of the millennium. The gospel story of abundance asserts that we originated in the magnificent, inexplicable love of a God who loved the world into generous being. The baptismal service declares that each of us has been miraculously loved into existence by God. And the story of abundance says that our lives will end in God, and that this well-being cannot be taken from us. In the words of St. Paul, neither life nor death nor angels nor principalities nor things -- nothing can separate us from God.

"What we know about our beginnings and our endings, then, creates a different kind of present tense for us. We can live according to an ethic whereby we are not driven, controlled, anxious, frantic or greedy, precisely because we are sufficiently at home and at peace to care about others as we have been cared for."

- Walter Brueggemann, "The Liturgy of Abundance and the Myth of Scarcity"

My ethics lecturer at Moore College, Andrew Cameron, would often say "scarcity is not the problem". At first, I thought he was crazy. Of course scarcity is a problem. There are people starving for lack of food or ill from lack of clean water, others who sell themselves into slavery for lack of money, or who go without medical care and suffer apparently unnecessary pain, farmers whose crops fail due to drought and changing weather patterns. All these people cry "we do not have enough!"

But that is not what he was saying. He was saying (I think) that scarcity is not the problem. Scarcity only becomes a problem due to other, deeper problems: our unwillingness to share, our ignorance (willful or otherwise) of the needs of our neighbours, our confusion of wants and needs, our fear that unless we hoard all we can then we might miss out, our delusion that endless economic growth is necessary for a healthy society or that boundless consumption will make us happy. These are the real problems. Scarcity is the symptom of a world out of joint. And lives based on the assumption of scarcity compound other problems. If I fear that there will not be enough to go around, I will be more reluctant to share.

The quote with which I began is from this article by well known Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann. It is worth reading in full (it is not too long) as a great articulation of the fundamental Christian belief in God's generosity. God is not stingy. He has not shortchanged us. He provides abundantly (though not infinitely as our childish dreams desires). There is enough. There will be enough. Be not afraid.

Give us this day our daily bread. Amen.

On Rowan Williams: now available

For those who may be interested, Wipf and Stock have recently published a new volume of essays titled On Rowan Williams: Critical Essays, edited by the irrepressible Dr Matheson Russell from the University of Auckland. The collection includes nine contributions from young Australian Anglicans, such as Ben Myers (Faith and Theology), Michael Jensen (The Blogging Parson), Andrew Cameron, Greg Clarke and more. There is a foreword by Oliver O'Donovan and a twenty-eight page bibliography of all Williams' published works. Here is the blurb from the publisher's site:

Theologian, poet, public intellectual, and clergyman, Rowan Williams is one of the leading lights of contemporary British theology. He has published over twenty books and one hundred scholarly essays in a distinguished career as an academic theologian that culminated in his appointment as Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Oxford University. Williams left this post to serve in the Anglican Church, first as Bishop of Monmouth, then Archbishop of Wales, before finally being enthroned in 2003 as the 104th Archbishop of Canterbury.

In this collection of essays, a talented younger generation of Australian theologians critically analyzes the themes that bind together Williams's theology. These sympathetic yet probing essays traverse the full breadth of Williams's work, from his studies on Arius, the Desert Fathers, Hegel, and Trinitarian theology to his more pastoral writings on spirituality, sexuality, politics, and the Anglican Church.

Here is what you get:

Foreword: Australia on Rowan Williams • Oliver O’Donovan
Introduction • Matheson Russell
1. The Ecclesiology of Rowan Williams • Rhys Bezzant
2. The Hidden Center: Trinity and incarnation in the Negative (and Positive) Theology of Rowan Williams • Andrew Moody
3. Disruptive History: Rowan Williams on Heresy and Orthodoxy • Benjamin Myers
4. Krisis? Kritik?: Judgment and Jesus in the Theology of Rowan Williams • Michael Jensen
5. Dispossession and Negotiation: Rowan Williams on Hegel and Political Theology • Matheson Russell
6. The Humanity of Godliness: Spirituality and Creatureliness in Rowan Williams • Byron Smith
7. Desire and Grace: Rowan Williams and the Search for Bodily Wholeness • Andrew Cameron
8. Rowan Williams on War and Peace • Tom Frame
9. The Beauty of God in Cairo and Islamabad: Rowan Williams as Apologist • Greg Clarke

The price is a mere US$29.00, or $23.20 from the Wipf and Stock website. Unfortunately, if you happen to live outside the US, then you'll need to contact the publisher to ask for a special order form (and pay approx US$13 in P&H). I have no idea why any non-US resident would consider buying a book about a Brit by a bunch of Aussies.
Twenty points if you purchase a copy of the book. Prove it by quoting the first sentence of a random page in the book. (Hahaha, what a brilliant marketing ploy!)

UPDATE: A nice review by Bruce Kaye.

In praise of... teachers (meme)

Having been tagged by Michael Jensen, I would like to praise five significant teachers in my life. As I am only allowed five, no offense is intended to the many gifted and caring teachers not found on this list. I have had four significant periods of formal education, so have picked one teacher from each period, and then taken the fifth from an experience of church.

1. Mr Warren Glass
Thornleigh West Primary school
Year 5 was the most important year of my primary school experience, probably of my formal education overall. Until that year, I had been a good and conscientious student. After it, I loved learning. We might not have covered the syllabus, but we had a great time and my horizons were stretched.

Every morning, we would begin with music, lots of it, singing along to the funny-looking man with the guitar. Then, we would discuss current affairs, society and culture. Sometimes, he would just talk about something that had come up in the news and that would take us through to morning tea, or even lunch. Others hated it; I couldn't get enough. After lunch, he would read us books and get us to respond to them creatively, turning the classroom into the narrative we were experiencing. I am sure we must have done some maths and spelling and so on, but I really don't remember. What I do remember is regretting hearing the bell for the end of the day.

Throughout the year, Mr Glass loaned me books personally, and would talk about them when I returned them, forming in me habits of critical novel reading that have continued and broadened ever since. I trace my sense of humour to him. He would tell jokes all day, and the feeling of starting to "get" some of them was a treat. To him I also trace the beginnings of my sense of social responsibility, particularly ecological concern. And Year 5 was also the time that I realised that being a Christian isn't something that happens automatically, but involves personal loyalty to Jesus. Although it took me a few more years to explicitly own that loyalty, the ground-clearing work that happened with Mr Glass was crucial.

Wherever you are, Mr Glass, I salute you - and I thank God for you.

2. Mrs K. Ballantyne
James Ruse Agricultural High School
Year 11 was for my high school years what Year 5 was for my primary schooling. My memories of those two years are far more vivid and three dimensional than the other years put together. Mrs Bal taught me English in year 11 and much of year 12. Educationally, until that point I had focused heavily on maths and science, selecting my subjects to avoid the humanities and studying English under some duress (even though I loved reading). Indeed, Mrs Bal initially had to talk me out of doing the lowest level of English offered at Ruse. Nevertheless, by the end of year 12, I would go on to study Arts at Sydney University, majoring in English and Philosophy. Since I had Mr Ballantyne (husband of Mrs Bal) for Physics, this transformation was something of a victory for her. Mrs Bal introduced me to T. S. Eliot (I still clearly remember reading The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock), to the first Shakespeare I really understood, enjoyed and was moved by (Hamlet) and to the delightful Tom Stoppard response (Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are dead).

I remember a story I heard about her first ever classroom as a young teacher fresh out of college at a rough school. When she walked in, a boy was sitting on a ledge, dangling his feet out a second-story window. She walked over and shut the window on him, leaving him outside on the ledge for the whole period! Whether it's apocryphal or not, it captures something of her creativity and charm.

3. Dr Geoff Williams
Sydney University
I first met Geoff (and he was, I think, the first teacher whom I knew on a first name basis) in a second year English course called Grammar and Discourse, in which he opened my eyes to the nuts and bolts of how language works via systemic functional grammar. We were looking at language so closely that I ended up writing my essay for the course on the opening of a Beckett play and ran out of space after I had discussed the first ten words! This was probably one of the best two or three classes throughout my Arts degree, which I initially selected on timetable convenience and on the casual recommendation of an acquaintance.

However, it was Geoff's personal care for each student in a large class that really grabbed my attention. He quickly knew everyone's name (rare in a lecturer, particularly in a class of around 50 or 60) and took all of his own tutorials. He worked hard to provide excellent examples of the language patterns we were studying and simultaneously introduced me to his second field of expertise: children's literature. When I ended up writing an English honours thesis comparing Harry Potter and Narnia, he became my surrogate supervisor (my official supervisor, based on my initial submission, was a modernist specialist (momentum from Prufrock!) and was humble enough to acknowledge himself out of his depth when my topic shifted).

Years later, his invitation to help teach a modified form of the grammar course (which had become immensely popular and so they didn't have enough tutors) rescued my battered passion for teaching after a year in the deep end as a high school teacher without training or experience. He continued to follow my progress for many years after university and we would regularly catch up for coffee, until he recently accepted an exciting post in Canada. I must write to him again soon.

4. Rev Dr Andrew Cameron
Moore Theological College
Amongst many gifted teachers at Moore, Andrew's gentleness, humility and deep insight were a bastion of sanity and humanity in a hectic and demanding environment. When he first taught me Philosophy 1, he was under the mistaken impression that I had a PhD in Philosophy, which led to some extra stress for him (since his specialty is Ethics, not Philosophy) and some unearned cred for me! Since then, I have been in a number of his classes and have thoroughly enjoyed them all. I also always appreciate his social issues briefings, which come out every "few" weeks.

In class, the wisdom and depth of his material was often veiled behind a lack of confidence and somewhat bumpy presentation, but there were so many gems that have formed me both academically and spiritually. Obviously, his love of ethics and Oliver O'Donovan in particular (see image)* have been very significant in shaping my own future direction.
*This is a picture of Andrew Cameron and Oliver O'Donovan. Andrew is wearing a shirt that our class made for him, which bears a portrait of OO'D with the caption "What would O'Donovan do?".

5. Rev Andrew Katay
St Barnabas' Anglican Church, Broadway
Many preachers and Bible study leaders have shaped me in a variety of related (and sometimes competing) traditions, but it is probably my years with Andrew Katay that have most significantly shaped my faith in Father, Son and Holy Spirit, my love of the holy scriptures and the gospel they proclaim (especially in the Gospels) and my hope in God's coming kingdom.

I met Andrew at my first SUEU event back in 1997 and worked closely with him for most of the five years I spent at Sydney Uni, in a variety of formal and informal contexts. Then, when Jessica and I were married and joined St Barnabas', Broadway, he was our pastor for another four and a half years (there is about eighteen months' overlap between these two periods) and for the final two years, he was also the immediate supervisor of my service as a catechist (student minister). During that time, I have listened to probably hundreds of his talks, sermons, studies, seminars and debates, and have spent hundreds of hours with him in committees, planning meetings, reading groups and casual conversations.

Although we chronically disagree in some areas (politics!), he helped me notice and begin to overcome many of the inherited dualisms in my theology, sharing a faith that is bigger and deeper than "Jesus saves": trinitarian in basis, christological in focus, cosmic in scope, graciously ethical in direction, generous in difference and with a resurrection hope.

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None of these teachers is without faults, but my prayer is to become a little more like the best in each of them.

Who have been significant teachers in your life? If you can't think of five, start with one. If you have a blog, consider yourself tagged. When you post, include a link in the comments here.

Sydney Anglicans on Peak Oil

I'm mentioned the Social Issues Briefing put out by the Sydney Diocese before. Written by MTC ethics lecturer Andrew Cameron (often with assistance from others), these semi-regular little pieces offer insightful ways into a variety of contemporary issues. Here is a full list of topics, but I particularly wanted to highlight the most recent piece on peak oil, in which Dr Cameron makes some excellent points about the place of Christian community in responding to this threat. God rescues us from a self-destructive focus on mere self-protection. Running away to my hidden hideout in the bush is no solution.

Click here to sign up to receive these excellent free briefings by email.