Sustainability and Spirituality

John E. Carroll

Description

This groundbreaking book explores the inherent interconnectedness of sustainability and spirituality, acknowledging the dependency of one upon the other. John E. Carroll contends that true ecological sustainability, in contrast to the cosmetic attempts at sustainability we see around us, questions our society's fundamental values and is so countercultural that it is resisted by anyone without a spiritual belief in something deeper than efficiency, technology, or economics. Carroll draws on the work of cultural historian and "geologian" Thomas Berry, whose eco-spiritual thought underlies many of the sustainability efforts of communities described in this book, including particular branches of Catholic religious orders and the loosely organized Sisters of the Earth. The writings of Native Americans on spirituality and ecology are also highlighted. These models for sustainability not only represent the tangible link between ecology and spirituality, but also, more importantly, a vision of what could be.

Foreword by Bill McKibben

Acknowledgments

1. Introduction

2. On Sustainability, Religion, and Ecology

3. Outstanding Models of Sustainability

4. Theory Behind the Practice

5. We Will Not Save What We Do Not Love: Sisters of Earth in Our Land

6. Monasticism, Sustainability, and Ecology

7. On Science

8. Social Justice Meets Eco-justice

9. Conclusion

Notes

Bibliography

Index

Informations

• Publié par: State University of New York Press
• Date de parution: 16 février 2012
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9780791484586
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

SUSTAINABILITY AND SPIRITUALITY
SUSTAINABILITY AND SPIRITUALITY
John E. Carroll
Published by State University of New York Press, Albany
2004 State University of New York
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior permission in writing of the publisher.
For information, address State University of New York Press, 90 State Street, Suite 700, Albany, NY 12207
Production by Judith Block Marketing by Michael Campochiaro
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Carroll, John E. (John Edward), 1944- Sustainability and spirituality / by John E. Carroll p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-7914-6177-7 (alk. paper) - ISBN 0-7914-6178-5 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Human ecology-Religious aspects. 2. Nature conservation-Religious aspects. I. Title.
BL65.E36C37 2004 201 .77-dc22 2003190067
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
This book is dedicated to the American women, religious and lay, who are compellingly showing us the way to an ecologically sustainable future. Quietly, gently, humbly, but with conviction, determination and passion, they are demonstrating how to live with ecological principles and how to carry out the Great Work.
There comes a time when each of us needs to celebrate miracles when we see them .
-Seamus Heaney
CONTENTS
Foreword by Bill McKibben
Acknowledgments
One Introduction
Two On Sustainability, Religion, and Ecology
Three Outstanding Models of Sustainability
Four Theory Behind the Practice
Five We Will Not Save What We Do Not Love: Sisters of Earth in Our Land
Six Monasticism, Sustainability, and Ecology
Seven On Science
Eight Social Justice Meets Eco-justice
Nine Conclusion
Notes
Bibliography
Index
FOREWORD
Some people might find it odd that John Carroll turns to a diverse collection of monasteries and convents for his examples of environmentally sustainable communities in this country. But on only a moment s reflection, it makes real sense.
For one thing, religious communities have always been interested in long-term survival-looking backward, that almost seems their raison d tre. Who, after all, tended the flickering flame of civilization for the centuries of the Dark Ages? In our time, too, survival is called into question. One need not be paranoid to sense that our arrangements are fragile, vulnerable (certainly not after 9/11, when our biggest and sturdiest buildings simply vanished). A dozen ranking ecologists have issued warnings in recent years that we are overshooting our limits, accelerating toward a cliff-pick your metaphor. And so the urge toward a kind of self-sufficiency, toward closed loops of food and energy. In people driven by personal fear, this takes tragic form: bomb shelters, weapons caches. In people driven by faith and love and hope, it takes the forms outlined here.
But of course a sense of approaching peril is not the main motivation for these communities. Instead, it is an affection for God s world, and God s creations, man included. For anyone holding such affection, these can be difficult times: if you really think about what extinction represents, or if you have witnessed what it means to be truly poor in the shadow of a rich world, then you have, no doubt, wanted to do something useful about it. And, no doubt, tried-joined organizations, written letters.
But most of us are almost hopelessly tangled in the various systems of our world-the need to make a living, the need to keep up appearances, the need in a stressed life to take pleasure from things. And it is here, perhaps, that religious communities really can show us the way. Not only are the convents and monasteries that Carroll profiles busy figuring out how to meet their own needs themselves, they are also busy making sure those needs aren t too large to meet. In the monastic tradition of joyful simplicity and pooled resources, they have found some of the secrets to real sustainability. Not, as Carroll points out, the ersatz sustainable growth of the politicians, eager to paint a green tinge on business as usual. Or even the wistful eco-consciousness of the guy with a Sierra Club sticker pasted on the back of his SUV. But the actual two-sides-to-the-equation effort at sustainability that getting ourselves out of our current pickle will require. One way to say it is: solar panels still aren t quite efficient or cheap enough to generate all the electricity a home could require. The ones on our roof, for instance, supply about half our juice. But if we could cut our needs in half . . . And we probably could, especially if we were living in some of the ways outlined in this engaging piece of reporting.
None of this would mean anything if life in these communities were long-faced, grim, and mournful. But by Carroll s account, and my own more limited experiences, it is anything but. Rich in the good things of the modern world-conversation, humor. But rich also in the things that so many of us pine for: actual silence, physical work, rest, companionship.
Carroll begins his journey looking for examples of environmental sustainability, and I think he has found them-more convincing examples than people who have looked in more obvious and secular places. But along the way he has also found something related, and just as important: examples of human sustainability, hints about ways that we might reshape our attitudes as compelling as our kitchens and gardens and boilers.
Bill McKibben
Ripton, Vermont
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
For research assistance in the field, I am indebted to Sr. Phyllis Plantenberg, O.S.B., Mark Dodson, Antonio Lujan, Darryl Birkenfeld, Lydia Villanueva, and Rob Gorman. For manuscript review assistance, I am indebted to Sr. Miriam Therese MacGillis, O.P., Sr. Gail Worcelo, C.P., Fr. Thomas Berry, C.P., and Beth Fisher. For devoted clerical assistance, I thank Linda Scogin, and for all-around assistance over the nine years of this project, I am indebted to my wife, Diana Carroll.
I am also grateful to the University of New Hampshire for awarding me an important sabbatical leave to conclude the research on this project, and to the Farrington Fund of the Department of Natural Resources of the University of New Hampshire for financial assistance.
Chapter One INTRODUCTION
Sustainability is an all too common word describing a condition which these days seems to hardly exist. Indeed, the extremely common usage of the word may be symptomatic of a deeper realization that the condition of sustainability, which most people would posit as both necessary and good, is nearly nonexistent. In fact, most usage of the word sustainability, it could be argued, whether by institutions or by individuals, refers to a shallow superficial and cosmetic form of sustainability which does not reflect sustainability at all and is inaccurate, perhaps even dishonest, in its usage. Can true sustainability, for example, be based on a foundation of nonrenewable natural resources such as fossil fuels? Not likely, and yet fossil fuels underly virtually everything we do, the entirety of the way we live, and the value system we live by. Can true sustainability be based on an energy intensive profligate wasteful lifestyle such as the world has never seen before? Not likely. Can true sustainability be based on a value system which, at best, concerns itself with miles per gallon in a motor vehicle but never questions how or for what purpose a vehicle is being used, who or what it is transporting and why? Not with any application of honesty. Can true sustainability be related to a consumptive lifestyle that seems to know no limit (and refuses to consider any concept of limits), a lifestyle predicated on growth for its own sake (the disease of growthism, which is what unrestrained capitalism is all about)? No, not if we are rational.
Steven C. Rockefeller has written that an activity is sustainable if it can be continued indefinitely. According to Rockefeller, Patterns of production and consumption are considered to be ecologically sustainable if they respect and safeguard the regenerative capacities of our oceans, rivers, forests, farmlands, and grasslands. . . . (S)ustainability includes all the interrelated activities that promote the long-term flourishing of Earth s human and ecological communities. 1
Sustainability, therefore, according to the true sense of the word, requires far more from us than the cheap, shallow, and superficial measures commonly taken under the guise of sustainability, measures such as those in agriculture and food systems, in energy and in other ways we utilize and/or relate to the Creation. True sustainability requires a change in our fundamental values, it requires us to be fundamentally countercultural and revolutionary, at least as to the common culture and its evolution since the Second World War, if not earlier.
A monk of my acquaintance in Minnesota once remarked to me that sustainability is a conversion experience. The secular world might scoff at this, figuring that a phrase like conversion experience might be what one would expect from a monk, priest, or clergyman. And yet, when one thinks about it, such a conversion experience is precisely what is called for if we are to meet the expectations of our own rationality. Surely, a true change in our system of values, if that is indeed what is called for, could only occur as a conversion experience, for it would necessitate a fundamental change from deep within us. Not simply to alter how we do things but to change the value presupposition of why we do things is a conversion of the deepest kind.
If, therefore, we argue that sustainability of necessity is a conversion ex