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Letters, Fall 2005
Readers respond to the March/April and May/June 2005 issues.
GLOBAL WARMING
I was impressed with Jon Luoma’s article (“Slaves to Energy,” May/June). He poses the problem of climate change in a moral context, expresses succinctly the salient facts, and gets the science just right. The Cedar Lane study was particularly gratifying, with its thoughtfully independent conclusions that, while hardly fitting the unspoken orthodoxy of many UUs, are nevertheless realistic short-term alternatives to our fossil fuel addiction.
In that context I was particularly distressed to read in the same issue Will Hamrick’s letter claiming “there is essentially no global warming.” I respect Mr. Hamrick’s libertarian views and truly hope there’s room for his political bent in our denomination. But science is not a matter of political opinion, and to deny global warming is to deny what is by now overwhelming scientific evidence that (1) Earth has warmed in the past fifty years at a rate unprecedented in at least a few thousand years and (2) much of this warming is due to human activity, in particular the combustion of fossil fuels. That increased atmospheric carbon dioxide leads to warming is not a matter of opinion or even complex science; it’s simple physics.
There’s some uncertainty about just how much warming there will be, how fast it will come, and how it will be distributed—but the fact of human-induced global warming is now so well established it’s embarrassing to see it questioned in a reputable publication like UU World.
Richard Wolfson
Weybridge, Vermont
(the writer is professor of Physics and Environmental Studies at Middlebury College in Vermont)
Luoma reported on the study group at Cedar Lane UU in Bethesda, Maryland. Group members seriously considered nuclear energy, but overlooked a more obvious solution to global climate change. A moratorium on childbirth, particularly among those in affluent societies, will solve this problem within one generation. This will not be easy. As a denomination, we too subscribe to the myth of “expand or die.” And yet, if we do not voluntarily solve this problem now, it will be involuntarily solved for us sooner than we wish.
John C. Sloan
Hollywood, Florida
The article by Jon Luoma places our energy dependence into a historic context and discusses what we can do to better manage it. There are several compelling reasons for us to overcome our addiction to fossil fuels in addition to their role in global warming.
First is the problem of air pollution caused by fossil fuel combustion. Recall smog, acid rain, mercury, ozone, and the like. Second is the destruction of natural wilderness areas caused by drilling and mining. Third is the fact that our need for foreign oil drives us to war and undermines our role in world politics. Finally, with respect to our dependence on oil there is the unavoidable fact that global production will begin to decline in the near future. Mother Nature only gave her children so much petroleum; she was trying to tell us something.
Richard Treptow
Richton Park, Illinois
I agreed with author Jon Luoma that we need to do things to “save energy and cut pollution” and that there are no simple steps to do so. However, I was concerned that the steps he did offer (“What You Can Do”) are much too simple, and will not have the necessary impact.
It is easy to simply replace high-energy-consuming goods with those that use less energy. It is harder to stop using such goods altogether. Energy-consuming goods not only take the energy that powers them, they also require energy and resources in their manufacture and disposal. We often ignore these “hidden” costs.
What will be required of us as we head into an energy-uncertain future is to stop buying energy-consuming products that we don’t really need. No one needs a clothes dryer or a car; we simply want them.
Now is the time to examine each aspect of our lives—and think before we buy or consume anything. If you want to start curbing carbon dioxide with steps that save money you’ll do better if you don’t buy stuff in the first place!
Rev. Jane Dwinell
Montpelier, Vermont
PRISON MINISTRY
The articles on prison ministry and the proposed UUA Statement of Conscience (“Ministry Behind Bars,” May/June) were a depressing reminder of how much worse things have become since the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee launched the National Moratorium on Prison Construction thirty years ago. In 1975 we were appalled that 500,000 Americans were behind bars, and we tried to be a rallying point for prison activists nationwide. We staffed offices in Washington, Atlanta, and San Francisco. We educated and organized, demonstrated and testified, did research and published the most comprehensive data on new prison construction available. But the country was hell-bent on punishment as social policy, and today more than 2,000,000 are behind bars. Hats off to YRUU and CLF for putting this issue back on the General Assembly agenda.
Richard Scobie
Waltham, Massachusetts
(the writer is executive director emeritus of UUSC)
Many thanks to UU World and to writer Warren Ross for your fine and fair description of the Church of the Larger Fellowship’s prison ministry pen pal program. Prompted by your article, many UUs from across the country have become pen pals to imprisoned CLF members. There is still a waiting list of prisoners and we hope that even more readers will explore this rewarding way to spread the hopeful message of Unitarian Universalism.
Additionally, your coverage of our ministry to prisoners showed that support for the Association’s Statement of Conscience on Criminal Justice and Prison Reform can have a hands-on, personal component that is of immediate value.
Rev. Kathy Reis
Prison Ministry Director,
Church of the Larger Fellowship
Boston, Massachusetts
As a new UU and an incarceree, I felt it would be good to learn about the church through the eyes of a member, and I wrote to the pen pal program. In May of 2003 I received my first letter from my pen pal, Marjorie S.
We had absolutely nothing in common except a love of life and learning. We continue to correspond to this day, and she has become one of my greatest friends, role model, mentor, and inspiration to grow.
Marjorie has been there for me through my personal struggle with addiction, torment in the prison system, and with my recent illness and subsequent chemotherapy.
My thanks to CLF, Amber Beland, Rev. Anne Hines, and especially my CLF pen pal, Marjorie, who’ve all helped me to be more than I was.
Evan M. Watt
Jamestown, California
MICROCREDIT
As I was reading “Microcredit Revolution” by Dorothy May Emerson (March/April), I found myself pumping my fist and triumphantly hissing to myself, “Yesss!” This is exactly the kind of work that showcases our mission in a light that all political stripes can embrace. I have been advocating the concept of socially responsible investing at my congregation, and I will continue to do so. Thanks for the pep talk!
Gerald Pollak
Hamden, Connecticut
When my husband died I wanted to perpetuate his memory by helping people in our UU international community about which he cared deeply.
For the past three years the Ted Guild Village Bank (TGVB) has been operating from Duaguete City in the Philippines. It makes very small loans to Philippine UUs for all kinds of projects—from raising a few piglets or a young cow, to raising rice, bananas, ginger, sugar cane, etc. The loans are being paid back with 1 percent interest and the money is put to work again and again. More than fifty UU families have benefited so far and lots of applications are pending.
Rev. Polly Guild
Weston, Massachusetts
HALF EMPTY OR HALF FULL?
UUA President William G. Sinkford’s May/June column “Half Empty or Half Full?” sent me back to Rob Eller-Isaacs’s “We the Powerful” in the January/February issue. Eller-Isaacs says, “We humans tend toward tribalism. We want to be with people who look and think and act the way we do.” When people come into a new place or situation they look for members of their own tribe. If they do not soon find their tribal confreres, they will leave.
Eller-Isaacs goes on to say that we “UUs stand in a theological tradition that calls us to welcome every stranger.” We can do that, but if that stranger does not ultimately find his own tribe among us, he or she will not stay. I think Sinkford is talking about how we can get new people to give us a try. I’m concerned about how we keep them. Eller-Isaacs asks if we are “compelled by our theology to expand our understanding of whom we mean when we say ‘we?’” I could interpret that statement to mean, can we increase the number of tribes in our congregations? If we can do that, we will improve our chances of increasing the population of UUs.
Woody Thomas
Naples, New York
GOING GREEN
I’m glad to see that General Assembly is trying for a greener conference (“A Greener General Assembly,” May/June).
There’s a lot UUs can do closer to home. One would be to do a zero waste coffee hour. In the old days, I remember helping my mother and her friends load the dishwasher. No one used paper cups. I can’t make much headway on this within my congregation, so my children and I maintain a personal zero waste policy: We use the china cups and wash them ourselves.
There are many other simple things anyone can do, from not using anti-bacterial soap to making sure coffee is shade grown (thereby reducing the destruction of the rain forest). Take your canvas bag to the store, pack your kids’ lunch in reusable containers, and inflate your car tires properly to up your mileage.
All these things matter enormously. My kids go to a charter school that practices zero waste, and when we have a school-wide picnic, everyone brings their own plates and real silver and we leave very little trash behind.
Claire Whitcomb
Madison, New Jersey
What we need is an enlightened and more human approach to religion and the environment. Unitarian Universalists have a Seventh Principle that declares our respect for the interdependent web of existence. We have six other principles that are equally important when we reflect on “the greening of the church.” Our Sixth Principle calls for a world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all. Joined together, all seven princples can form the basis for a responsible program for environmental justice. In isolation, our Seventh Principle is just a candle in the wind.
Rev. Robert Francis Murphy
Falmouth, Massachusetts
FREQUENCY CHANGES
Your changes in frequency leave me out in the cold. I won’t be able to access the UU World Web magazine or e-mails. I’m conflicted about paying for outreach (which should be a good thing) by cutting back on my paid subscription to a magazine I prize. Am I alone?
Marget Pack
Princeton, New Jersey
Like many other groups you seem to assume all readers have access to e-mail and the Internet. I know the proportion of users is growing; at least you recognize that not all of your readers “are big users of the World Wide Web.” But some UUs doubtless have no access, and ignoring that segment seems a sort of separation, probably correlating with family income, that Unitarians generally avoid.
James B. Weaver
Bradenton, Florida
BOOKSHELF
I find George Lakoff’s division of strict father family vs. nurturant parent family too simplistic a metaphor to explain the mushrooming of conservative churches (Bookshelf, May/June). In fact, after interviewing many of the ultra-liberals in my own UU congregation, I’ve come to believe that these liberals are actually rebelling from their own childhood’s strict father families.
Could it be that the families who are flocking to conservative churches are not interested in creating strict father families but are instead trying to protect their children from the values-relative materialistic vacuum that our liberal society has created since the 1960s?
Patricia C. Johnson
Goleta, California
I enjoyed the review of George Lakoff’s Moral Politics. The review talks about the family model, where the strict parent/nurturing parent models define the different views. I think it goes deeper than that.
There are two truths in our lives. One is that we must tend to our lives and our needs first. The other is that we must connect, serve, and place others first.
The conservative view is an extension into public policy that self care is the highest truth. The language of conservative ideology is rich with notions of the strong self and self-sufficiency. Liberals believe that our care of others is the highest truth. The common good defines what is good. Sharing is the highest form of action.
In my experience of life these truths take turns being the “highest” truth; the navigation between them defines part of the beautiful tension of being human.
John Mott
Nashville, Tennessee
UU B&Bs
The article by Donald E. Skinner in the May/June UU World was of particular interest to me (Congregational Life). After some of us talked of visiting UU bed and breakfasts around the country, we decided that our small church (fifty members) could help balance its budget by taking advantage of the majesty of Niagara Falls located within walking distance of our building.
This will be our second year of housing, feeding, and entertaining forty UUs from around the country for four days and three nights in July. What great fun was had by all! It proved to be a most successful fundraiser as well as a project that created pride and unity within our church community, which was going through a difficult period.
Betsy Diachun
Youngstown, New York
MULTICULTURAL VISION
In May I attended the installation of the Rev. William Chester McCall at the Unitarian Universalist Church of the Restoration in Philadelphia. The Rev. McCall is a gay person of color.
Seeing the congregation and observing the intention in action of being a multicultural congregation inspired me to ask: “Could my church look, feel, and be like this?”
The service made me euphoric, but the grounded part of me believes that those who understand multicultural ministry, embrace it, and want others to understand and believe as we do, must articulate our vision and a covenant that will enable us to stay the course. The work is challenging, and anyone who takes it on needs to be resilient and accept that no one has a corner on the truth. Everyone is going to make mistakes. Anchors that can keep the process in place are mutual respect and listening to one another, even when we disagree.
What I took in is joy created by shared community and vision. I ask us all, “Could our churches look, feel, and be like this?”
Sarah Munson
Arlington, Virginia
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