A sustainable lifestyle
Last week I came across an article in “the Guardian” from Clare Bryden. It was about sustainable lifestyles and the lessons she learned on sustainability while spending some time with the monks of Mucknell.
The article starts with the need to find a sustainable lifestyle. We all know that we are now living an unsustainable lifestyle. We all want something to be done about it and we look to our governments. But despite all the discouraging news on climate change, there is not much change in lifestyle. Carbon emissions are still rising and there is sometimes even disinterest in the whole issue. Mind and hearts of and the government and the people are not focused on capable solutions for climate change. While rethinking, the journalist came across a group of monks and nuns of Mucknell Abbey in Worcestershire, England. They live by the rules of St Benedictine who started the movement in the 6thcentury. Important to them are stability, conversion of life and obedience. Stability because you have to be committed to the place and to each other, conversion because you have to refer to God in every aspect of your live and thus also be celibate and poor and obedience which means listen intently. The journalist says obedience is most important in today’s world since it is the hardest to work on. There is a lot of practice found in the way the community orders it’s life ordering by balancing prayer, manual work and study. The activities get you more connected with food, shelter and environment. As a newcomer, you may be highly idealistic, but you quickly learn to embrace a healthy idealism by sustainable growth, both physically and spiritually. As the journalist says, during her stay at the community she came to understand that their lifestyle is rooted in the present with regards to the future and to understand the results of our behaviour onto others. (http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/belief/2011/sep/15/sustainable-living-benedictine-monks).
Also I read an article written by a monk about the Christian virtues. These virtues play an important role in climate change mitigation, since our current (western) lifestyle is centred on greed and this lifestyle needs to change if we want to alter climate change. The consumer lifestyle has brought many benefits, but what has it done to our souls? What mental picture do we have of the world? How we picture our life and our needs can have impact on ourselves, others and our community. “We are learned not to wait, but to buy now”. The antidote to this greed is to learn to wait. The virtue of temperance can be used to fight climate change. We long for and wait and when we get we still enjoy, but temperate. Maybe by the economic crisis and also the ecological crisis, will help us to understand the Christian virtues again. Instead of thinking of happiness as “feel good”, we need to think of happiness as to know what’s good and also do it. Instead of only pleasure and consumption, we need an ecological conversion to pleasure and consumption in the context of good life. Religious communities have a unique role to play in this change of attitude. And by this we mean Christians as well as others. This virtue project will deliver us from climate catastrophe. Discussion about climate change now has to come into action. The church will also need to cooperate critically with government and business. Ofcourse this will challenge today’s way of life. It’s about finding a new lifestyle, a discipline of recognition of others because they too belong to our Earth (http://www.operationnoah.org/node/117).
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