This Just In: Two Elements Addressed

Australian religious leaders pledge interfaith response to fires
ENI-09-0156

By Kim Cain
Melbourne, Australia, 23 February (ENI)--Australian religious leaders have made a commitment to a unified response to the devastating bushfires that have seared across southeast Australia, particularly the state of Victoria. ...

Global ecumenical network wants Lenten action on water
ENI-09-0157

By Stephen Brown
Geneva, 23 February (ENI)--An international network of church-linked agencies campaigning for access to water is using the Internet to promote water justice during the period of Lent, the annual Christian season of penitence in preparation for Easter....

Does anyone have a mere Christian proposal for earth and air (and aether)?

Comments

[Deb]

Are you making fun of these efforts? If so, why?

[Joe Long]

Well, the top one looks to be a natural disaster response and just fits the elemental theme...but "water justice" ? Seriously, this is what Lent is supposed to be about?!

I, too, await with bated breath the "aether justice" policy proposal.

[Deb]

It's interesting that Christians who have always lived with unlimited access to all the potable water they could ever want find it amusing that some people want to help those who have barely any access to potable water at all.

Is this what Lent is all about? Well, we heard the gospel about the Last Judgment in church just yesterday. I would imagine that if you were ever the one in whom Christ appeared as thirsty (chronically thirsty, never having enough clean water), and the people trying to help you talked about water justice, you might not pause to savor some snark in your amusement at their project before, say, you drank water from the well they provided you.

[Michael]

Maybe the Lent water justice folks should hook up with the folks at Advent Conspiracy. The idea of "water justice" sounds silly, but it's not a bad cause--access to clean water is something that is apparently pretty easily addressed. Check out AC's promo video on YouTube.

[Judy K. Warner]

Access to clean water is an important issue, but I object to the word "justice" in connection with it. What does it have to do with justice? Are people with clean water stealing it from others, and that's why we should be penitent about water? Perhaps that's what Jim was pointing out with his post. And what does "campaigning for access to water" mean, anyway? It sounds like a typical leftist thing, making something that is a matter of science, or technology, or property rights, or economic development, into a moral cause so they can feel virtuous.

[Michael]

Judy--

A fair point.

[Joe Long]

God bless the U.S. Peace Corps, the U.S. Army, and others who seriously help move Third World populations a few centuries forward with their clean water supplies. I certainly understand I've enjoyed a much better water supply than most people throughout most of history - a benefit of Western civilization, and God bless that, too.

"Campaining for access" - on the Internet, no less - doesn't sound like practical action, to me. Could be wrong, of course...doubt it.

[Jim Kushiner]

To tell the truth, I posted the two headlines and opening paragraphs because they came in together in my inbox and I found it interesting to have fire and water ecumenically addressed, and so my closing comment. I don't know enough about the stories to judge the value of the efforts, but most certainly helping to provide water to those lacking it is an act of mercy. Would that we could divert some money from more dubious "charities" (Planned Parenthood?) to simply feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, and providing water for the thirsty.

[Michael D. Harmon]

That's precisely Bjorn Lonborg's point about "global warming' mitigation efforts -- for much less money spent on improving the lot of the world's poorest people, we could do much more good. But we wouldn't be using the issue to impose controls on the world economy by the left's elites, so nobody supports him.