Grandad Reflects on Faith, God, Climate & Environment

 

  As I write we are alert for the birth of our first great-grandchild due tomorrow. What an exiting event. This child will be born into a family which will be welcoming and caring and excited to share his or her life. All four great grandparents have reached the eighties, so there is a good chance this child will too. Amid the sense of joy, I have been reading a great deal about the threat to the planet with global warming. Frequently it speaks of “by the end of this century”. That always seemed a long way off, but now I realise our great grandchild will likely live to then. Somehow it seems closer. This means that in this one child’s lifetime unless much more drastic action is taken by our world’s leaders the planet will experience increasing flood and fires, the disappearance of some Pacific islands and some coastal cities, the loss of the Great Barrier Reef and perhaps 8o% of all coral reefs, displacement of millions due to the rising sea levels, greater poverty, and loss of a

Most of us now know that global warming is a fact and that it affects the future of our planet. Those of us who have younger family members including children and adults are rightly concerned for their future. Those of us who have friends in low lying areas and particularly in the pacific island countries are aware that some of them are under immediate threat. Often the problem seems too big, and we do nothing much in resignation.   Here are some simple actions you can take – and if you haven’t already you can begin today. (The good news that almost everything you do will save emissions and also save your money.) 1.        Every night, switch off as many appliances as possible at the wall not just the remote. If there is a little light showing you are using some electricity. Don’t switch them back on until you need them the next day. 2.        Turn off lights when you leave the room or if there is sufficient light don’t turn them on at all. Switch off anything you are not u

I awoke from a dream with the words going round in my head….. Your God is too small. In the dream I had somehow been aware of times of need or grief or fear when I had turned to prayer and yet the words came – Your God is too small. God could not be conceived or as merely a personal support or guide or means of finding peace or healing. Then I had noted matters with the family as a whole where I had cried out for help and support – but again the words had come, Your God is too small. God was not just their to look after those I love and worry for. I thought of our community and nation. Times of pandemic and threats of war. And yet the words repeated, Your God is too small. God is not there to fulfil nationalistic pride and desires – to support wone nation against another. I had dreamed of the poverty and starvation and displacement of people around the world. But still the insistent – Your God is too small. God is not just about the human race and its needs and its amazing ab

From childhood for some reason part of Hamlet’s soliloquy has caught in my mind. “Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, Or to take arms against a sea of troubles, And by opposing end them?”. For many of our Pacific Nations the sea is in fact a sea of troubles with the possibility of some being extensively flooded and some disappearing as global warming increases. Already thy have suffered the devastation of typhoons and underground eruptions. In Australia we are concerned we might lose power now and then but as billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes has pointed out “At some point we have to admit we have made this problem ourselves.” He was the one who provided funding for candidates in the recent election who supported policies to promote climate action and most of the independents who were successful were in that group. As its majority shareholder he also scuttled the plans of AGL to divide the company assets in a way that would pre

 I chose not to publish this in paper form to avoid adding unsold books to the environment so you are free to download and copy Faith and the Concept of God and to use it with acknowledgement. It is not available otherwise and there is no cost involved. Grandad