Had an opportunity to deliver the sermon on Sunday, August 11, 2013 at the Unitarian Universalist church I attend. The sermon was titled: Satyagraha 'Truth Force' and our Climate Reality and it being only 23 minutes long was just a taste of the presentation I was trained to give early this summer with the Climate Reality Project (more on that in a later post.)
Here is an excerpt from my sermon on what we can do now as individuals:
Are we conserving water? If we need to water our lawns and gardens – do we do it early in the morning rather than in the full heat of the day? Do we use tap water rather than bottled water which drains our aquifers and/or other people’s aquifers? Do we use a rain barrel to collect water to use in our gardens?
Are we conscious of the chemicals we use on ourselves and in our homes? Are we aware of what chemicals go down our drains or filter thru our lawns to our aquifers? Read the labels! Be very aware of Green Washing – if the bottle is green and there is Green in the title – if can still be very very bad for the environment. The Environmental Working Group is a great online resource to use to find out the actual ingredients in products we use AND they also provide links to the research that say which ingredients are not so good for us or the environment.
Do we buy local whenever possible? Making local purchases your first choice reduces the amount of transportation and the loss of other diminishing resources needed to bring the item to your doorstep.
Can we reduce the plastic in our lives? Plastic is made of petroleum – glass is good. Cotton is good. Many of us are already using cotton bags when we grocery shop – let’s do that more. We already know there are great containers available – metal and glass - to carry water and other beverages with us rather than buying it in plastic bottles – let’s do that. Storing food in glass is better than plastic anyway as it avoids the plastic poisoning we now know happens with that.
Can we use public transportation more? Can we walk or ride our bikes more?
Can we unplug our electronics that run when we are not in the room or at least at night while we sleep? Those battery charging things we leave in our wall sockets that we use for our phones? They are using electricity when they are plugged in. Unplug those.
If you have an investment portfolio, have you divested from the oil, gas and coal companies? If you only have a 401K and can’t really control the investment bundles that are among the choices – can you call your investment brokerage firm or speak with your contact there and tell them that you personally would like to see an option that supports renewables or that intentionally avoids the oil, gas and coal industries?
When we come across climate change related articles – read them. It’s important to know what’s going on. Share that information with family and friends. Talk about it. It’s important we all work to break the silence on this issue. This silence on climate change was likened a few times in our training to having an alcoholic parent in the home. Everyone knows it’s a problem but no one talks about it because you know that there will be a ‘blow up’. We need to stage several small interventions I think and get us collectively past this reluctance to say that this issue scares us and we need start doing something about it.
We will feel better taking action – that’s how this works.
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