Discuss: Climate Revelations

It appears to me that a social transformation of a hard to imagine kind, a radical transformation not witnessed by anyone now alive, is in the offing. Perhaps powerful human forces of sensibly-directed “intentional will” and emotional contagion, engendered by a deliberative dialogical process and embraced by the family of humanity, will lead to a rapid paradigm shift and a new, more reality-oriented set of humane {to replace profane} social values. When the new way of thinking about the world we inhabit and better social values are reasonably mobilized and become ubiquitously evident in the self-limiting actions of members of participatory democracies {to replace the conspicuous over-consumption activities of the selfish leaders of governing oligarchies}, I expect the family of humanity will find its way from the profane values and unsustainable lifestyles of the elites, such as we see today, to a sustainable future world order on this sacred Earth.

I don’t know which emotion I feel more strongly: anger at people like Auden whose views of religion have been so ignorant and dismissive for so long; or shame at myself and my fellow believers for giving religion such a public face unattractive to Auden or anyone else.  I think shame wins out.

Congrats to Auden for the courage to explore unfamiliar territory.  I agree that climate and most sustainability issues are spiritual at their core, because they challenge us to answer bedrock questions:  Who are we?  Why are we here?  What is the relationship between us and the natural world?

Thanks for a great article.
Gary Gardner