SERMON #3

How about this for a fashion show? On one side of the runway you've got models wearing the trendy clothes kids spend their hard-earned money on. Cruising down the other side you've got the poverty-stricken youth from Southeast Asia who made this collection. The contrast should be enlightening--or maybe just embarassing.

Doesn't anyone else care about the increasing gap between the haves and the have-nots? Millions of people wearing the finest clothes, eating the best food, driving the fastest cars, while most of Earth's population eat a small bowl of food, then sleep on a mat for a few hours, reseting up for another 18-hour workday.

Did you know that HALF of the SIX BILLION people on the planet live on less than TWO DOLLARS a day? Less than the price of a cup of designer coffee at Starbucks. Makes me sick just to think about it.

Our STUFF lives better off than most of the people in the world do.

This is to say nothing of how we're treating nature. Drill for oil in the Arctic Circle? Why not? Rich white men need to get richer don't they? Drop the emission standards so gas companies can turn a bigger profit? Sure! Why worry about the ozone layer when we've got stockholders to think about?

Nature is going to mutiny one of these days--"Day After Tommorow"-style earthquakes and floods to evict our sorry butts.

I mean, doesn't anyone remember the Lorax? Who is speaking for the trees these days? We're producing and consuming ourselves into oblivion, completely out of touch with the real world, the natural world. If your life depended on it, could you tell what time it was by the sun? Could you find north without a compass? Could you tell the difference between a white oak and a red maple? Didn't think so.

(In case you're interested, the maple is the one with the wide, three-pointed leaves.)

We're not fit to live in the world anymore; we're tourists, clear-cutting our way across the planet till nothing's left.