Plastic Jesus Earth Day 2024
Weltanschauung. One of the first words I learned when studying religion in college. It translates as ‘worldview,’ and is used to describe how we view the phenomena of human existence, the world, and the cosmos where we find ourselves. We are learning the hard way that perception and perspective shape our worldview and the way we understand where we are, who we are, and what we ought to be doing. For instance, for some time it has been accepted that Christopher Columbus discovered America. From the point of view of those indigenous peoples who already lived on this continent for thousands of years, it is just as true to say that they discovered ship-loads of strangers suddenly arrive on their shores. Without trying to sound too woke, how we look at that moment in history, how we let it inform our worldview, makes all the difference.
A quotation from Dahr Jamail, a journalist, war correspondent, and advocate for the life of planet Earth, is making the rounds on Facebook: “The single biggest thing I learned was from an indigenous elder of Cherokee descent, who reminded me of the difference between a Western mindset of ‘I have rights,’ and an indigenous mindset of ‘I have obligations.’ Instead of thinking that I am born with rights, I choose to think that I am born with obligations to serve the past, present and future generations, and the planet herself.” [i] The difference of a “mindset,” or a worldview, one’s weltanschauung, makes all the difference. How we look at our life together on planet earth and on this continent deserves a careful examination of how we have arrived at this moment of climate crisis that threatens the very life of the planet.
Dahr Jamail has written a book, The End of Ice, subtitled, Bearing Witness and Finding Meaning in the Path of Climate Disruption. In it he describes a moment of critical insight when, speaking with an Inuit elder in his nineties while at the northernmost town in the US in Alaska. When this elder was a kid, “the Arctic Sea ice was visible ten to fifteen miles offshore in the late summer. Now the ice is 180 and 250 miles offshore. In one lifetime that’s how much has been lost. Hearing this, I felt a sense of overwhelm and dread. I also felt deep sadness for the Inuit who had spent their whole lives relying on that ice for their hunting and their culture.” [ii] Perception and perspective make the difference in how we look at the world and our place in it.
Many of us may remember this song: “I don’t care if it rains or freezes, as long as I got my plastic Jesus, sitting on the dashboard of my car. Going 90, it ain't scary cause I got the Virgin Mary sittin' on the dashboard of my car.” Written in1957, the song made us laugh! It was funny. Now we might hear this as a perfect theological metaphor for the climate crisis facing us. Despite the commandment against idols, graven images, we have Plastic Jesus. Made from the same substance that fuels the car to go 90 miles per hour, which we now know burns more fuel than going 50 miles per hour, spewing pollution and threatening the ozone that protects our fragile island home from too much Sun. Like the White Rabbit in Lewis Carroll’s book, we always feel as if “It’s late.” Life speeds up. We accelerate our use of fuel, and to make our smile whiter and brighter when we get where we are going, microplastic particles are used as ingredients in personal care products such as face washes, shower gels and toothpastes, and form one of the main sources of microplastic pollution, especially in the marine environment. The fish we eat are filled with these particles.
We have ignored, at our peril, the all too subtle prophetic warning in the movie, The Graduate, when Mr. McGuire whispers in Benjamin Braddocks’s ear the single word, “Plastics.” In the film, “plastics” is understood to mean a cheap, sterile, ugly, and meaningless way of life, boring almost by definition—the embodiment of everything about the values of the older generation that seems repugnant to young Benjamin. Plastics! What a joke! How uncool! [iii] It turns out to be more than simply uncool. Plastics, and the act of extracting oil from below the surface of the Earth, are two of the most destructive threats to the health of the planet. It does not take much reflection to see that we have long made an idol out of plastics, and an idol of Jesus at the same time. Even more so, we have made an idol out the money and wealth that can be produced and consolidated from the production of plastics and all goods made from petrochemicals. Plastics represent one dimension of the Golden Calves we create, and to which we bow down before the raging Bull of Wall street that stands on Broadway in New York City’s Financial District.
All this, despite the Bible’s prohibition of idols. And its suspicion of all things made by human hands. The story we read of building the Tower of Babel, brick by brick up to the sky, an attempt to reach the God of Creation himself. The Tower stands as another metaphor of human hubris – our all too human exaggerated pride and self-confidence. This hubris drives the myth of “the self-made man,” and the “rugged individual” who “pulls himself up by his or her own bootstraps.” We have lost all notions of our interdependence upon one another, and all others. Especially those who have gone before. Those who make it possible for us to continue to be the stewards of the earth God creates us to be. Even more so, we seem to have given up on following in the way of the Good Shepherd, resulting in fewer green pastures, and fewer and polluted “still waters” by which we might get off the treadmill of “it’s late,” and lie down for some well deserved and necessary Sabbath time. The Good Shepherd who says, “I am the gate for the sheep. All who have come before me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep have not listened to them.” [iv]
In fact, we have not only listened to the thieves and robbers; we have bowed down to their desire to profit from the wanton destruction of the planet. So, we place Plastic Jesus on the dashboard of our metaphorical cars wanting to believe he will somehow return to save us from ourselves and our seeming bottomless desire for all things plastic. The song, it turns out, is not funny at all. It is ironic at best. We forget his invitation to follow him, and follow the Golden Calves instead.
Jesus says, “I have come that they may have life, and have it abundantly.” The operant word is “they.” Archbishop Desmond Tutu, in his forward to The Green Bible, reminds us that the Bible is not concerned with individuals with individual rights, but rather for our interdependence upon one another. We are created for togetherness, for living and working together in community, because we are meant to learn from one another. We are complimentary in the sense that I have gifts that you don’t have, and you have gifts that I don’t have. We need one another. This is the fundamental worldview of the Bible, and things go horribly wrong when we flout this law, this worldview, this Dream of God.
In Genesis, after God created birds, fish, and animals, God
created humans to be the stewards of creation and caretakers of one another –
to act compassionately and gently toward all forms of life. The future of this
beautiful planet is in our hands. Jesus, described as the source and shepherd
of our Peace, our Shalom, says of his ascent to the Cross, “And I, when
lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” [v]
In this cosmic embrace, Jesus wishes to enfold all that God creates, the entire universe, all things seen and unseen, into unity. He seeks to draw us closer to one another, closer to God, and closer to our true selves as stewards of God’s creation. These are holy obligations, more reflective of the indigenous mindset of obligations, rather than a mindset that declares we have rights. Our obligations are to one another, to God, to ourselves and to our planet.
Archbishop Tutu concludes, “It is possible to have a new kind of world, a world where there will be more compassion, more gentleness, more caring, more laughter, more joy, for all of God’s creation, because that is God’s Dream. And God says, “Help me, help me, help me to realize my dream.” [vi] We are those people invited to follow Jesus, not to make him into a plastic idol. For those of us who desire to follow the Good Shepherd, who desire to be united in his cosmic embrace, this needs to be our worldview. It must be our obligation. For every place we stand is Holy Ground. Holy Ground that depends upon our stewardship and care for creation, and one another. All others. Amen.
PS Dahr Jamail was once asked: For people who want to know more about climate disruption, where do you recommend, they start?
"Go spend time on the planet. That’s the first and most important thing any of us can do. We need to be moved to action from a deep place of love for the earth, instead of a place of fear and concern. I’m watching what’s happening to the planet and I’m being present with it. I love this place, and from that love stems my motivation." [vii]
[i]
Jamail, Dahr, in an interview on Lion’s Roar https://www.lionsroar.com/the-end-of-ice/
[ii]
Ibid
[iii]
Seabrook, John, Plastics, in the September 13, 2010 New Yorker magazine
[iv]
John 10:7-10
[v]
John 12:32
[vi]
Tutu, Archbishop Desmond, Forward to The Green Bible (Harper Collins, New York:
2008) p. I-14
[vii]
Ibid, Jamail
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