Thursday, October 12, 2006 at 12:12am
We are the 'awareness' of creation
Column: Our Place in the Universe
I grew up in a household of engineers, mathematicians and scientists. No wonder I don't like having to rely on facts and figures! I was the artistic, heartistic one. I liked something because it moved my heart. I acted on something because I "felt" it was the thing to do. But when I changed careers in my 50s, I was "told" to get "credentials." In other words, I'd better have some facts and figures under my belt in order to meet the world head-on.
In this column I wanted to write about industrial expansion and global warming. I wanted to have all the facts and figures at my fingertips. It would have been a very long column — there are a lot of facts and figures! But then I was talking to a friend about it. "Do you know," I asked, "how long we have been using coal and oil?"
"Since the Industrial Revolution?" she guessed. Sounds good, doesn't it? That was the time during which technology took off. Manual labor was replaced by machines, which in most cases were powered by steam which came from the burning of coal. That was the late 1700s. But we've been using coal for much longer than that.
The Chinese mined coal 3,000 years ago. Oil was used by the ancient Babylonians more than 5,000 years ago. Natural gas was found in Iran, some say, more than 8,000 years ago! My point is that since we've been using coal, oil and gas for heat, light and energy for thousands of years, this is going to be one hard habit to break.
One expert, Bill McKibben, in his book "The End of Nature," wrote that climate changes arise from the use of fossil fuel. What we've done in the last 300 years is learn how to obtain it more efficiently, creating better way of using it. Seemingly, it has become indispensable to our modern way of life.
Now, if we want to change our behavior and our very idea of who we are and what we need as "civilized" folk, we will have to all work together to "reinvent the human," as Thomas Berry, cultural historian and Earth scholar, puts it in "The Great Work." E.O. Wilson, who has authored a new book, "The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth," has sent out a plea to Christians to work together with scientists such as himself to make the idea of stewardship a reality.
Both ideas will take a shift of consciousness — one that is already happening — one that I've been talking about here in this column, with the idea that we are the "awareness" of creation. I've read other columnists who are Christian ministers, Buddhists, and Jews, who have also written about becoming one with nature.
They've written about evolutionary and cosmic consciousness. Couple this with an understanding of the sacrifice made by Earth herself to grow us, to nurture us, to feed and clothe us day after day with little or no gratitude, and we begin to see the path we are on — one that may lead to our own extinction if we don't learn how to work along with Mother Earth.
At this point most aspects of human society are built on the notion that we must continually grow in order to be prosperous. Growth has become our reason for being, leaving happiness running far behind. We have super-sized our cars, our hamburgers and our clothing. What we could have done, rather than investing in ourselves, would have been to invest in Third World countries and their industrial expansion. We could have learned from our own mistakes and shown them a more efficient and less harmful use of technology.
Humanity has the ability to reflect on the lessons Earth's own pollution and extinction problems have taught. The first pollution problem began 2 billion years ago when bacteria learned how to separate hydrogen from oxygen and polluted the atmosphere with a deadly buildup of oxygen. The bacteria took care of it by learning how to work together.
By studying our legacy, one given to us by Mother Earth herself, we may find our roots, ones that will lead to the uncovering of a heart connection, beyond facts and figures, but using the facts and figures. This may be just the "reason" we need to create new habits and ways of thinking that are inclusive of the whole of creation — and just might make us happy to boot!
— — —
Anne E. Ulvestad is a free-lance writer residing in Maryland. She has her master's in earth literacy, and is available for public lectures and group presentations on Spirituality and the Environment. Anne can be reached at {email anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com}anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com{/email}. © copyright 2006 by Anne E. Ulvestad
In this column I wanted to write about industrial expansion and global warming. I wanted to have all the facts and figures at my fingertips. It would have been a very long column — there are a lot of facts and figures! But then I was talking to a friend about it. "Do you know," I asked, "how long we have been using coal and oil?"
"Since the Industrial Revolution?" she guessed. Sounds good, doesn't it? That was the time during which technology took off. Manual labor was replaced by machines, which in most cases were powered by steam which came from the burning of coal. That was the late 1700s. But we've been using coal for much longer than that.
The Chinese mined coal 3,000 years ago. Oil was used by the ancient Babylonians more than 5,000 years ago. Natural gas was found in Iran, some say, more than 8,000 years ago! My point is that since we've been using coal, oil and gas for heat, light and energy for thousands of years, this is going to be one hard habit to break.
One expert, Bill McKibben, in his book "The End of Nature," wrote that climate changes arise from the use of fossil fuel. What we've done in the last 300 years is learn how to obtain it more efficiently, creating better way of using it. Seemingly, it has become indispensable to our modern way of life.
Now, if we want to change our behavior and our very idea of who we are and what we need as "civilized" folk, we will have to all work together to "reinvent the human," as Thomas Berry, cultural historian and Earth scholar, puts it in "The Great Work." E.O. Wilson, who has authored a new book, "The Creation: An Appeal to Save Life on Earth," has sent out a plea to Christians to work together with scientists such as himself to make the idea of stewardship a reality.
Both ideas will take a shift of consciousness — one that is already happening — one that I've been talking about here in this column, with the idea that we are the "awareness" of creation. I've read other columnists who are Christian ministers, Buddhists, and Jews, who have also written about becoming one with nature.
They've written about evolutionary and cosmic consciousness. Couple this with an understanding of the sacrifice made by Earth herself to grow us, to nurture us, to feed and clothe us day after day with little or no gratitude, and we begin to see the path we are on — one that may lead to our own extinction if we don't learn how to work along with Mother Earth.
At this point most aspects of human society are built on the notion that we must continually grow in order to be prosperous. Growth has become our reason for being, leaving happiness running far behind. We have super-sized our cars, our hamburgers and our clothing. What we could have done, rather than investing in ourselves, would have been to invest in Third World countries and their industrial expansion. We could have learned from our own mistakes and shown them a more efficient and less harmful use of technology.
Humanity has the ability to reflect on the lessons Earth's own pollution and extinction problems have taught. The first pollution problem began 2 billion years ago when bacteria learned how to separate hydrogen from oxygen and polluted the atmosphere with a deadly buildup of oxygen. The bacteria took care of it by learning how to work together.
By studying our legacy, one given to us by Mother Earth herself, we may find our roots, ones that will lead to the uncovering of a heart connection, beyond facts and figures, but using the facts and figures. This may be just the "reason" we need to create new habits and ways of thinking that are inclusive of the whole of creation — and just might make us happy to boot!
— — —
Anne E. Ulvestad is a free-lance writer residing in Maryland. She has her master's in earth literacy, and is available for public lectures and group presentations on Spirituality and the Environment. Anne can be reached at {email anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com}anne@ourplaceintheuniverse.com{/email}. © copyright 2006 by Anne E. Ulvestad