Let's get back to caring about the planet. Let's teach our children to recycle like we did a few years back
Contributed By:The 411 News
Gifting for good with a Xmas hoot
Are you old enough to remember reading in school? Do you remember reading about changes in the environment through the years? I can go back further than some, but not as far as others. However, if you’re reading this, you’re old enough to have seen that the earth changes.
Everything changes. Nothing is static. Even when we can’t see the changes, they happen. We cannot actually see a baby changing… or a flower blooming… or a strand of hair turning gray, but we see the results. If you lived in the country, like I did, and was charged with chopping cotton or beans or anything entrusted to your care, like I was, you know the truth of what I say. No matter how intently I watched the shade of a tree, or weed, or blade of Johnson grass, I never managed to catch it change its pattern on the ground! As a result, I never made enough progress for my daddy, who counted my scientific observations as laziness, and had to suffer the consequences.
Some of us, sufficiently grown, have never even considered the idea of “earth change,” going on our merry way, confident that “as it has been, it will be forever.” The phrase, “everything changes,” applies only when it suits our pleasure, and we don’t worry ourselves about “things we can’t control.”
Does baseball or football or other sports fit that category? We know the players by heart. Oh, yeah. We know their stats, their positions, their salaries… We know about accusations of spousal abuse… and engage in argument more fiercely than a grossly overpaid lawyer! We know all about them, even though we’ve never been closer than a remote. We are a stockpile of trivia – trivia because it’s information that doesn’t matter one iota in our lives!
We jump up and down when they hit – or miss – a shot… or a punt, stomp like a 2-year-old when the second baseman misses a tag, and curse like a sailor when “that fool” swings at a ball in the dirt! We cuss or clown, pump fists or frown, depending on who did what. In a word, we get involved! Yet, we couldn’t care a flying hoot about that which affects our very lives!
What, pray tell, has happened to us? What insect, what infection, what curse has landed and drained our brain, leaving us senseless, shells of our former, promised selves? Have we drunk from the fountain of foolishness? Does our brain prove that the dodo bird is not extinct after all?
Let’s get back to caring about the planet. Let’s teach our children to recycle like we did a few years back when bins were placed in schoolyards. Let’s press our council reps to press our neighbors to obtain and use recycle bins, with fines for non-compliance.
Stewardship of God’s creation should be a priority for our churches. How can we gather in the sanctuary while ignoring the poisons we force on others? Can we justify saving the soul and killing the body?
Let’s take a break from self-centeredness and think about others – this generation, and those to come, a tip from the past, Smokey the Bear or Woodsy the Owl, favorites from the early seventies. You can find him – for yourself, and/or a cool Christmas gift for someone else – by searching Hooded Sweatshirt GIVE A HOOT DON'T POLLUTE HOODIE, or a lace inset, GIVE A HOOT DON’T POLLUTE Official Woodsy The Owl Lace-up v-neck T-Shirt Medium for women on ebay.com… maybe…?
Search for other “old skool” reminders – for yourself, or as a gift to someone that means something to you… and others… even all the others you don’t even know!
Story Posted:12/15/2018
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