Earth is our home: March 2006 Archives

Sometimes a preacher cuts some material out of a sermon. Perhaps it seems to divert from the intent of what the preacher wants to say, sometimes it is too radical, or too spiritual for the audience, or adds unnecessarily to the length. Here is an outtake from a sermon I wrote in 1996. I don't know why I cut it.

I have preached the sermon in different versions since then, but this is the first time the out take has been made public. It is a peak into my preaching soul from ten years ago.

I'll publish the sermon. I wonder where it was supposed to fit?

Yesterday, I was talking with a retired minister about Florida.  The subject drifted from native plants to native people, and what we knew about Florida before 1491.  I expressed my opinion that "indigenous wisdom" has much to teach us, and he expressed surprise.  "You mean that you think there is something behind all that superstition," he said, "aren't you romanticizing the past?"  The liberal clergy have had a love affair with modernism, and many continue to suffer under the prejudice that all thinking by pre - Enlightenment people was irrational and not worth serious consideration.

I have been thinking a lot about "indigenous wisdom" lately.  The Six Nations (Iroquois) told stories about the "three sisters" which were corn, squash, and beans.  They told how these three food plants were gifts to the people, how the people learned to care for and cultivate these together, and the stories told the people that the cosmos was broken when three sisters were not grown together.

Superstition?

We now know of that corn, squash, and beans provide complimentary proteins, provide a balance of fibers and complex carbohydrates, and planting them together provides a natural nitrogen depletion and renewal cycle thus contributing to a sustainable agriculture.

The so called science advanced by modernism is based on reductionism,  breaking things into smaller and smaller mechanism.  But the observations of the indigenous people led to wisdom, because it was based on seeing connections.

The illustration is from Cooking with the Three Sisters.

I reprint here a study of one state, but all states have similar problems with automobiles. Florida's emergency rooms are in crisis because of auto accidents.

Car reliance is roadblock for California
By Paul Dorn which was an op-ed article published in the Sacramento Bee, 01/23/05

In his second State of the State speech on January 5, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger put his finger on the major source of California's financial distress. "This is a car-centered state," said the Governor.

Unfortunately, Governor Schwarzenegger failed to identify this dependency on automobiles as a problem. "Californians can't get from place to place on little fairy wings," said the Governor. "We need roads."

The Governor's condescension aside, there is a growing recognition that California's over-reliance on cars is hurting our economic competitiveness, harming our health, damaging our environment, and emptying our bank accounts. We can no longer afford our expensive car habit, which costs us plenty beyond the considerable expense of roads, vehicles, fuel, insurance, and maintenance.

Housing

California's high housing costs challenge low- and moderate-income workers while hurting business' ability to attract top-flight talent. This affordable housing crisis is exacerbated by our car-centered transportation system. The huge acreage needed for the movement and parking of automobiles drives up the cost of the remaining land. This expansive pavement reduces our community's tax base, shifting the tax burden onto the non-paved properties, again raising the cost of housing. Precious public money devoted to road maintenance and construction diverts funds away from affordable housing development, education, healthcare and other useful social spending. Off-street garage parking--often required by outdated zoning codes--adds even more to the costs of residential construction.

Healthcare

Motor vehicle crashes kill more than 4,000 Californians every year, and 310,000 car crash survivors require expensive ambulance response, emergency room care, pharmaceutical treatments, and lengthy rehabilitation. This highway carnage adds stress on our heavily burdened healthcare system, driving up the costs of insurance and medical care. Our health care costs are further increased by automobile-related stress, noise, toxic emissions, and the obesity-inducing sedentary lifestyle facilitated by our drive-thru car culture.

Water

Managing California's water resources for the needs of residents, agriculture, industry, and wildlife is a serious challenge, made more severe by the impact of our car dependency. Auto-derived toxins and particulates contaminate surface water sources. Leaky underground tanks at the thousands of gas stations needed to fuel our vehicles contaminate groundwater. Our car-dependent sprawl hinders the replenishment of aquifers, and contributes to erosion and heavy silting of streambeds.

Investment

The considerable expense of owning and maintaining an automobile contributes to the abysmally low savings rate of Americans. Yet this expensive automobile is parked for 90 percent of its lifespan, representing a huge amount of social wealth tied up in rusting automotive metal. Even more capital is consumed in a Sisyphean task of maintaining roads and streets to barely accommodate ever growing traffic. The incredible amount of social wealth needed to support auto-dependency means fewer resources are available for more productive investment, slowing our economic growth and holding down wages.

***

For decades, California's transportation spending has heavily favored automobiles. We are now paying the price of this unbalanced policy. Improving the efficiency of California's transportation system will require a more balanced, multimodal approach that includes transit, walking, and bicycling. We also need policies to better connect transportation investment with land use to discourage destructive and expensive sprawl.

Certainly, as Governor Schwarzenegger suggests, California needs more roads. But we are in greater need of sidewalks, bike lanes, transit systems, and passenger rail. Above all, we need political leadership to tackle the costly auto-addiction of our "car-centered state."

Paul Dorn is executive director of the California Bicycle Coalition (www.calbike.org).

Cyclists worked to get the streets of the United States paved in the late 19th and early 20th century, and bicycle repair shops were the mechanics for the new horseless carriages.  Now the drivers think cyclists don't belong on the streets.

Most trips in an automobile are less than 5 miles in length, about 20 minutes on a bike.  If 20% of those trips were on a bike instead of a car, it would make a radical difference in traffic, pollution and in gasoline prices.