E
ethereality
Guest
I had to stop 15% into the Pope’s new encyclical “Laudato Si”: It’s too depressing for bedtime reading. It presents a dichotomy: Either we radically change how we’re living, adopting a life of sacrifice rather than convenience (our technology trades pollution for convenience), or we continue destroying our planet. And it seems to me most are too self-centered to even bother reading his letter, let alone live such a life of patience and self-denial.
Where are the promising signs to chase away my despair? Only the hope of the life to come after I die? So far, with the self-centered collective destruction of our planet I see only one more reason to die, not another reason to live.
Is there any chance the next G8 Summit will bear good fruit? How can we apply brakes to our culture which consists of hyper-specialized full-time jobs with one goal to the exclusion of all else?
Answering my question, “How to cope?” I would say we must accept that we are in a dire situation, and personally work to change it one day at a time:
Where are the promising signs to chase away my despair? Only the hope of the life to come after I die? So far, with the self-centered collective destruction of our planet I see only one more reason to die, not another reason to live.
Is there any chance the next G8 Summit will bear good fruit? How can we apply brakes to our culture which consists of hyper-specialized full-time jobs with one goal to the exclusion of all else?
Answering my question, “How to cope?” I would say we must accept that we are in a dire situation, and personally work to change it one day at a time:
*]I will continue reading the encyclical, but not, I think, before bed. Perhaps when I am sitting on public transportation, etc.
*]Last night I felt called to change careers, from radiation oncology for the rich (cancer therapy in the USA or Japan) to establishing clean drinking water for the poor (those who lack clean drinking water), or go into energy to either increase battery storage, solar technology, or infrastructure (e.g. recycling),
*]but I am currently a slave to my American student loan debt ($137k @ ~7.1% interest) which I incurred getting a Master’s degree to work in radiation oncology as a physicist. The only way out appears to be working in this field for another 10-15 years (i.e. until I am 38-43).
*]Try to educate others through personal conversation, political correspondence, and internet discussion.
*]Live my life as an example, e.g. getting up at dawn to minimize electricity use (saying goodbye to evening parties), cooking my own meals to minimize waste from convenience stores,[1] taking the stairs rather than elevator, using fans rather than air conditioning, clothing rather than heating, dressing appropriately rather than fashionably (white clothing in the summer to reflect heat, black clothing in the winter to absorb it), using a bicycle rather than a car.
I don’t know what to do about the problem of ridicule, though: I shared my thoughts with some incoming students (first year Japanese master’s students, me being a first year American doctoral student) about taking the elevator one flight short and walking the last flight to save energy, and they just laughed at me and declared it strange. (Our student room is on the eighth floor.)
They were Japanese, so that’s a different set of problems,[2] but as for Americans, do they not think in terms of moral relativism, hence undermining “leading by example”? I have been told the solution to moral relativism is to be happy, and then leading by example will work because people will want to be as happy as you. I do not know how to be happy, though, because I am suffering so much (physically and psychologically): I cannot be happy knowing that I have a loving Father in heaven who will make everything right, because I cannot regard these thoughts as knowledge rather than hope. (If someone were to ask me if Christianity were true, I would have to tell them that I hope it is but don’t know that it is. I know that I suffer, but I don’t know that my suffering is worth it.)
What are your thoughts on all these matters?
[1] It is common in Japan to buy meals from convenience stores to eat at one’s desk to minimize time spent not working; of course all the plastic wrapping is thrown away. The alternative is bringing a ‘bentou’ or boxed lunch, i.e. a “sack lunch” from home.
[2] The Japanese think in “us/them” categories, so it will be very, very difficult for them to see me as a role model, rather than as “an American”. They would need to see a Japanese person do something to regard it as a role model, and even then, Japanese don’t change their custom unless everyone does it. I likewise asked my part-time boss (Canadian, has lived in Japan >20 years) whether I could open the window instead of use air conditioning, and that idea was shot down because “Japanese companies don’t do that.” So there would need to be some political pressure and government decision; the most I could do would be to encourage the Japanese Christians I know at church to contact their politicians.
