VOL. 10, #3, Autumn 2001

INSIDE THIS ISSUE:        

SPECIAL COMMENTARY:

Jesus, Hope, and the Reign of God

by David Seljak, St. Jerome’s University and a member of the Challenge for Change Conference Planning Committee

“The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor.  He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovering of sight to the blind, to set at liberty those who are oppressed, to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord” (Luke 4:18-19)

For those with eyes to see, the world can seem pretty hopeless.  We see nprecedented environmental destruction, a widening gap between rich and poor nations, the abandonment of the poor and powerless here at home, a post-Cold-War boom in arms sales, the worsening plight of women, children, and the powerless, and the apparent inability or unwillingness of our governments to deal with these crises.  Where is hope?

As Christians, we do not despair because we are people forever marked by the Resurrection.  The life, death, and resurrection of Jesus made it clear to us that with God all things are possible.  This year, Challenge for Change will explore how we, as followers of Jesus, can find hope.

Christians interested in bringing their values to public life often find it difficult to discuss Jesus.  In fact, he often disappears in North American debates about human rights, the common good, and social justice.

Sometimes this is because we believe that our partners in justice might feel uncomfortable with too much talk about Jesus.  Other times we are afraid of being identified with those Christians who are not afraid to talk about Jesus in public but who often ignore the social dimensions of his good news B the feeding of the hungry, the healing of the sick, the liberation of prisoners, and the
installation of a world of peace.

Whatever the reason, we end up dreaming about the coming Reign of God without thinking much about Jesus.

However, any careful reading of the gospel reveals that Jesus expresses a radical view of a coming Reign of God, a time of the vindication of the poor and the oppressed.  It is a message of a new earth (God’s Kingdom come; God’s will be done on earth).  All human needs will be met and every tear will be wiped dry.  We shall live in harmony with God and with one another.  This revolution in
human affairs will be ushered in not by kings, prime ministers, and CEOs but by those who, like Jesus, allow themselves to become servants, that is, those who give their lives to liberate others rather than to exercise power and rule over them.

The Reign of God is here among us in the hundreds of life-affirming acts we find in the margins and at the bottom of our society.  But this Reign is also “not-yet”.  We still wait for its full expression.

This is our hope.

This year, Challenge for Change will explore how Christians can find hope in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus.  To help us reconnect to Jesus as a source of hope, we have invited William Herzog II, author of Jesus, Justice, and the Reign of God: A Ministry
of Liberation (2000) and Parables as Subversive Speech:  Jesus as Pedagogue of the Oppressed (1994).  In his work, he portrays Jesus as a “prophet of the justice of the reign of God”.

For Herzog, “the choice to become a justice people is not primarily a political decision but a christological commitment” a commitment to the Risen Christ and the Vision of the Reign of God he preached.  He writes, “To confess Jesus is Lord is to confess a desire to pursue the vision of justice that informed Jesus work.”

 

FORMER J & P COMMISSION MEMBER "MARTYRED” IN JAMAICA

On Sunday, June 17, Martin Royackers, SJ preached about Jamaica’s nagging problem of crime and violence:  453 people have been killed on this island since January 1.  “This could also happen to me,” he said.  “And if it does, I want to be buried here among my people.”  Four days later, on June 21, Martin, 41, formerly a member of the Justice and Peace Commission of the Diocese of Hamilton, was found dead, a bullet in his heart, outside the door of his seaside office at St. Theresa Church, Annotto Bay, where he was pastor.

The media coverage of Martin’s death and subsequent burial in his adopted land, as well as the Ontario memorial masses held at Loyola House, Guelph and in his home town of Parkhill, spoke about his passion for justice and for the people of Annotto Bay.  They also referred to a telephone death threat that he and another Canadian Jesuit, Jim Webb, had received prior to Martin’s murder.  The threat dealt with a development project which the two Canadians initiated, which, among other things, involved an application to the government to release 60 acres of unused government land for local agricultural production, so that local people could have a home and meaningful work.

The contentious project was part of the work by the St. Mary Rural Development Project (SMRDP), a joint effort by local people, the
Canadian Jesuits, several sisters of the Sisters of St. Joseph of Hamilton, and the CIDA (Canadian International Development Agency).  The circumstances around Martin’s death suggest that the murder was related to this development work.  But Martin was always outspoken, especially on justice matters; thus, he forged on, despite warnings by the police to take the death threat seriously.  As< his close friend, Doug McCarthy, said at Parkhill, “Only a bullet could silence Martin.”

Martin’s Jamaican pastoral works varied from marketing local produce, being the pastor of several isolated mountain parishes, ghost writing pastorals for the Archbishop of Kingston, lecturing on the Catholic social teachings at a local seminary, chairing two school boards, and writing relevant hymns for mass.  As well he was developing a reputation as an evangelical “preach’n man”.

Some people describe Martin’s death as a martyrdom.  Indeed, a letter from the Jesuit Superior General, Peter Hans Kolvenbach, that was read at Parkhill, said he was the fortieth Jesuit to die since the mid-70s, when the Society of Jesus committed themselves to
serve faith and promote justice more deeply.  One of the first to die, in 1977, Rutilio Grando (made famous for his ties with
Archbishop Oscar Romero), worked in circumstances much like Martin’s.  For as Kolvenbach predicted in 1974, “The cross will
immediately appear to us, including great suffering...  Are we ready to follow such a path?”

Theologically, Martin’s death could be a martyrdom, not just a murder in a chaotic country whose majority have been oppressed by
remnants of a slave culture, landlessness, poverty, and the International Monetary Fund.  Anyone who worked with Martin when he lived
in this diocese knows his outspokenness on justice issues, his impatience at seeing the underdog messed up in unjust situations.  They
know his passionate commitment to the faith, whether it be through his pastoral work as a chaplain at the University of Guelph
(1990-1994), his involvement with the Justice & Peace Commission, the Ignatius Farm Community, and the Jesuit Farm Project (the
mid-1980s to 1994).  They know that his faith commitment left him impatient with our consumer society’s status quo B the Pope’s “a
Culture of Death”.

Indeed, this passion kept coming up in personal recollections as much as people’s anecdotes about Martin’s infamous chain smoking, his
love of pig farming, and his pastoral efforts to lure “pagans” (lapsed Catholics) back to mass, during the Parkhill and the Loyola
House memorial services.

Martin’s requiem mass and burial on a Jamaican mountainside occurred on the feast of St. Ireneaus, the second century Church father
and possible martyr who believed that only a rootedness in God can make a “man fully alive”.  Certainly Martin was fully alive.  But
here in Canada, Bishop John Sherlock of London admonished those present at the Parkhill memorial mass to do the same.  The bishop said
that although few people are called by God to so totally give their lives to Christ as to die, Martin’s obvious commitment to the
service of God and to the poor calls us to live out our own faith.

Let us not let Martin’s life be wasted but keep Martin’s heritage alive in our own work for justice!

 

WHAT OTHERS ARE SAYING

 - Senator Doug Roche, O.C., in The Ultimate Evil (1997)

Editor’s Note: Roche will be speaking on “Bread Not Bombs” at the St. Jerome’s Centre for Catholic Experience, Waterloo, on Friday,
October 26 at 7:30 p.m.

 

SIMPLY JUST LIVING INFORMATION

Eco-labels.org Web site - If you’ve been trying to make socially and environmentally-responsible choices in the marketplace, you’ve
probably noticed the proliferation of eco-labels.

Products bear emblems claiming that they are organic, dolphin-safe, cruelty-free and so on.  But how can a consumer be sure that an
eco-label is meaningful?  The Consumers Union, publisher of Consumer Reports Magazine, has created a new Web site, eco-labels.org,
that helps shoppers understand these labels and the standards behind them.

“There are a lot of labels and a lot of claims out there.  And just because it has a nice picture and a claim, (it) does not
necessarily mean that there are standards behind it,” says Urvashi Rangan, project director of the site.

Consumers can search the site for labels in several ways: by specific product, logo, or category of label (such as “organic”). 
Eco-labels.org also includes a virtual kitchen, where consumers can find general information, including what labels are used on
specific products such as coffee.

http://www.eco-labels.org/

              

LIVING FREE OF POLLUTION CALLED BASIC HUMAN RIGHT

New York, New York, April 30, 2001 (ENS) - In a historic move, the United Nations (UN) Commission on Human Rights has concluded that
everyone has the right to live in a world free from toxic pollution and environmental degradation.

In a statement issued from its Nairobi Headquarters, the UN Environmental Program (UNEP) hailed the Commission’s decision to invite
High Commissioner for Human Rights, Mary Robinson, and UNEP Executive Director, Klaus Toepfer, to organize a seminar on strengthening
environmental and human rights principles.

The successful implementation of international environmental treaties on biodiversity, climate change, desertification and chemicals
can make a major contribution to protecting human rights, Toepfer added.

The results of the seminar will be considered at the Commission’s next session in March 2002 and will feed into the review of progress towards sustainable development that has been achieved since the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. This 10-year review will form the basis for the World Summit on Sustainable Development, to be convened in Johannesburg in September 2002.

The Commission’s decision, which marks the first time the UN body has addressed the links between the environment and human rights,
was taken at the conclusion of its 57th session in Geneva on Friday.                           

http://www.unhchr.ch/html/menu2/2/57chr/resolutions.htm

2001-2002 RIGHT LIVELIHOOD, RIGHT LIVING LECTURE SERIES

*Stephen Scharper: THE COSMOS IN A CONSUMER SOCIETY: WHERE FAITH AND ECOLOGY MEET, St. Jerome’s Centre for Catholic Faith &
Experience, St. Jerome’s University, September 14.  While various religious traditions are grappling with the ecological crisis, St.
Michael’s College, Toronto, theologian Stephen Scharper argues that they are also confronted by a globalized “consumer” culture,
which  at time challenges their own respective cosmological world views.  Scharper explores the new integration of ecological concern
and faith and asks: How can we ‘follow the cosmos’ in a consumer society?

*Theresa Schumilas, food systems activist and president of Canadian Organic Growers on “Our Food System, Our Health, and Local
Justice”, Wednesday, October 17, Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church, 1107 Main Street West (at Cline Avenue South) 7:30 p.m.  Theresa
is a former Director of Nutrition Services for the Regional Municipality of Waterloo.  She is also an advisor to a new project,
“Foodlink” in Waterloo Region, and is a director of the Power of Vegetables - a series of organic demonstration gardens in Wilmot
Township.  Theresa will integrate social, environmental and economic aspects of our food system and explore the myths and benefits of
eating organic food.

*Senator Douglas Roche, O.C.: BREAD NOT BOMBS, St. Jerome’s Centre for Catholic Experience, Waterloo, Friday, October 26, at 7:30
p.m.  Senator Roche argues that the challenge of globalization is to spend new wealth to fight poverty, not to stockpile weapons. 
While 30,000 children die daily from easily-preventable diseases, the world spends $781 billion a year on weapons.  To spend money on
bread, not bombs (also the title of one of his books), Roche writes, "a transformation of human consciousness, as great as the
transformative power of globalization itself must occur”.  This is the St. Jerome Centre’s 2001-2002 John J. Wintermeyer Lecture in
Christianity & Public Policy, which this year has been co-ordinated with this series.

*Joe & Stephanie Mancini of The Working Centre, "PARENTING FOR A NEW ECOLOGY: Integrating Family, Work, and Growing Food”, Joe &
Stephanie have thought out the challenges of raising faith-filled children in the midst of our dominant consumer society, and they are
willing to share their experience of raising their own three children.  Wednesday, Nov. 14, Holy Rosary Church, Emma St. (off
Stevenson), Guelph.

*Henry Koch, interpretive naturalist of the Guelph Arboretum and an eco-lifestyle activist on "GETTING PAST OUR AUTO ADDICTION”. 
Henry sold his car, lives well without this "convenience”, and re-discovered community. Come and learn about alternatives to our
car-based culture, which accounts for up to 41% of our smog and consumes 50% of our urban space. Thursday, December 6, at the Working
Centre, Queen Street South, Kitchener, 7:30 p.m.

*Dorothy McDougall, Toronto School of Theology, "THE SACRAMENT OF THE EARTH”, Grace Evangelical Lutheran Church, 1107 Main Street West
(at Cline Avenue), Hamilton, 7:30 p.m.

*Jim Profit, SJ, Jesuit Ecology Project, Guelph, “LIVING PEACEFULLY ON THE EARTH, A NON-VIOLENT APPROACH”.   February 20, Working
Centre, Queen St. S., Kitchener, 7:30 p.m.

“OUR  ECOLOGICAL FOOTPRINT”, Fr. Paul Hanson, formerly of the Redemptorist Office for Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation in
Rome.  Holy Rosary Church, 175 Emma Street (off Stevenson), Guelph, March 13, 2002, 7:30 p.m. 

Elizabeth May, executive director of the Sierra Club of Canada, Elizabeth focussed national attention to many environmental issues
such as the use of cosmetic pesticides, the Syndey Tar Ponds that have contaminated an Cape Breton community.  Hear her wisdom on how
we can link our daily choices to their faith B of which justice for all peoples and the planet is an integral part!      Wednesday,
April 10, 7:30 p.m., Old Walkerton Town Hall, Walkerton. (Co-Sponsored with the Greening of Walkerton Community Group.)

This series is co-sponsored by the Diocese of Hamilton Social Awareness Office/Justice & Peace Commission; the Working Centre,
Kitchener; the Jesuit Centre for Social Faith and Justice, Ecology Project, Guelph; and the St. Jerome’s Centre for Catholic
Experience.

 

CRY OF THE EARTH; CRY OF THE POOR

by the Social Affairs Commission of the Quebec

Bishops’ Conference, May 1, 2001

 1. For several years, the people and the communities involved in defence of the rights of the poor have linked the issue of
poverty that of the destruction of the ecological environment.  In fact, the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor are one.  At
first glance, these expressions may seem surprising.  We must ask ourselves: Are we still capable of hearing and listening to the cry
of the poor?  Are we attentive to the cry of the earth itself?...

In the process of social analysis, we have a tendency to separate social issues from ecological ones.  We view ecological issues
(desertification, pollution, diminishment of biological diversity, climatic changes, etc.) as scientific and technical challenges and
even as political challenges that are out of the hands of citizens, and consider social questions as issues in and of themselves,
separate from their context.  On this point it is good to recall the conclusion already made in 1987 by the World Commission on
Development and the Environment:

Until recently, the planet was a large world in which human activities and their effects were neatly
compartmentalized within nations, within sectors (energy, agriculture, trade), and within broad areas of concern (environmental,
economic, social).  These compartments have begun to dissolve.  This applies in particular to the various global >crises’ that have
seized public concern, particularly over the past decade.  These are not separate crises: an environmental crisis, a development
crisis, and energy crisis.  They are all one.

...We strongly urge Christian Communities to become actively involved in ecological issues related to the social challenges of our
society....

...In fact, the environment is a central issue that calls into question our individual and collective behaviour and obliges us to
reflect on the place of human beings in the universe and of their relationship to God and to the Earth...

All of us must hear the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor and the cry of those deprived of their future and the distress of the
earth ransacked by excessive consumption....

The commitment to justice and to the promotion of the rights of the poor is not just an added task for believers.  It is the very
corollary of the commandment to love.  This labour of love takes priority through solidarity and the clear and courageous search for
justice.  This work is never finished; it is always ongoing.  In this regard, our role is one of vigilance and foresight.

Note:      Full statement can be found at www.eveques.qc.ca/aeqdoc_cas_2001_5_1_e_0.html

BULLETIN BOARD

Friday, October 12, 2001 

COMING OUT OF THE CLOSET: RELIGION IN PUBLIC AFFAIRS.  The first Somerville Lecture in Christianity and Communications featuring
national columnist, author, and CBC Radio contributor, Richard Gwyn - St. Jerome’s Centre for Catholic Experience, Waterloo.  For
information contact St. Jerome’s at (519) 884-8110 or, because it is being repeated in Toronto on October 16 by the lecture’s
co-sponsor, the Catholic Register, visit www.catholicregister.org.

October 19-20, 2001    

CHALLENGE FOR CHANGE CONFERENCE: JESUS & HOPE - Dave Seljak’s special commentary in this issue explains our reason for inviting
theologian William Herzog II to this year’s ecumenical get-together.  Theological reflection by Janet Somerville, Canadian Council of
Churches.  Workshops include: Jesus & Jubilee with Lee Cormie; Educating for Justice with Jennifer Henry of Kairos (the new ecumenical
organization for eco-social justice after 10 Days, etc. merged); Simple Living: Spirit, Theory & Practice with Alice Schuda;
Responding to Climate Change with Jim Profit, SJ; Cancelling the Debt with John Dillon of Kairos; Organizing Your Community with
Jaquie Thompson of LIFE*SPIN.  St. Peter’ Lutheran Church, Queen Street North, Kitchener.  More details in the enclosed
pamphlet/registration form (for those on our mailing list).  Otherwise, contact the Social Awareness Office (905) 528-7988, ext. 233.

November 16-18, 2001                   

SPIRITUALITY OF A COMPOST HEAP.  The annual Central Mission Conference at Scarboro Foreign Missions.  This year’s leaders are Toronto theologian, Dorothy McDougall, and our own Jim Profit, SJ, of Guelph.  The theme on ecology and Christian responsibility as part of
the third year of the Canadian Ecumenical Initiative (CEJI), which sees Jubilee as being rooted in the earth.  For information,
contact Sister Mary Gauthier (416) 653-7378.

December 1, 2001                          

ADVENT--WAITING FOR WHAT: PRESENTS OR PRESENCE?: The annual Social Awareness Office Advent Retreat.  An opportunity to reflect upon how we can joyfully celebrate our faith during the Christmas commercial rush and beyond.  Led by Joy Warner, co-ordinator of the Spiritans’ Justice, Peace, and Reconciliation Committee, 9:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. at Regina Mundi Church, 631 Mohawk Road West, Hamilton. $20 (includes fair trade organic coffee and vegetarian lunch).  Pre-register by November 27.  For details contact (905) 528-7988, ext. 233.

February 8, 2002                             

READING THE BIBLE: HOPE & HISTORY with Toronto theologian, Lee Cormie, a founding member of the Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee Initiative (CEJI).  Hear Cormie’s biblical ideas about how the Spirit of Hope moves in history.  He will probe Leviticus 25 and Luke 4 for an
illumination of the Bible’s comments on today’s poverty, injustice, and ecological destruction.  It’s the first Scarboro Mission’s
lecture at the St. Jerome’s Centre for Catholic Experience, Waterloo.  For information, call (519) 884-8110.

              

NATIONAL INTER-FAITH ACTION: “End Child Poverty Fast!”

September 27-October 4, 2001

A Week of Prayer, Fasting, and a Call to Political Conscience

Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free and
to break every yoke?  Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the
naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?         

Isaiah 58:6-7

Dear friend,

We are writing to invite you to join a multi-faith action in support of Canadian Children and families living in poverty.  A wide
range of churches, synagogues, faith groups, and organizations that have been supporting the work of Campaign 2000 are organizing this
initiative.

Background

As you already know, Statistics Canada data indicates that one in every five Canadian children still lives below the poverty line. 
Canada ranks a low 17th among OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation & Development) countries in term of how we deal with
poverty.  And more recently, Canada has fallen to third place on the UN Human Development Index, primarily because of our collective
failure to address poverty in Canada.  Many within the faith community believe this is morally unacceptable and economically
indefensible in a country as wealthy as Canada.

From Thursday, September 27 to Thursday October 4, 2001, we are inviting people of faith from across the country to join in a week of
prayer, fasting, and a call to governments for a change of heart.  This time period begins with Yom Kippur, the Jewish Day of
Atonement, and leads up to World Food Day and Thanksgiving.

Some levels of governments have made some very modest steps under the National Children’s Agenda.  But they are not enough.  Many in
our communities have participated in previous actions and signed petitions and have written politicians.  Those efforts have been
important and have helped.  What is required of Canada is a change of heart and what is required of our political leaders is a call to
political conscience to do more...much more!

The prophet Isaiah, as prophetic today as he was then, makes clear the link between spirituality and action, advocacy, and
righteousness.  The prophet does not allow us to choose apathy, to hide ourselves from our neighbours.  Instead our faith requires us
to share our food with the hungry, house the homeless, and loose the knots of injustice.

Through prayer and fasting we hope to remember that many mothers are forced to go hungry at the end of the month so that their
children can eat, that too many Canadian children go to school hungry due to poverty, that too many children are left alone or in
unacceptable situations due to lack of affordable child care, and that too many families in our communities lack safe, affordable
housing.  Through prayer and fasting, we hope to rekindle our commitment to work for justice and serve our neighbours in need...

How You Can Be Involved

As a person of faith in your community, we invite you to turn your faith into action and help spread the word to your colleagues and
congregation members.  This is what we are asking of participants:

Pray for Canadian families living in poverty so that Canadians might take responsibility for sharing our resources for the common good
of all.  As an act of sacrifice and solidarity, fast from dawn to dusk, or by skipping a meal on Thursday, September 27, or Thursday,
October 4, 2001.  If you wish, plan a community meal to collectively break the fast.  During that week, call you MP and provincial
MPP/MLA to political conscience.  Urge them to take action on child and family poverty.  As how the federal government will follow up
on its January Throne Speech commitment to ensure that no Canadian child lives in poverty.  Ask what steps your provincial government
is taking to alleviate child and family poverty in your province.

If you prefer, write a letter or send them an e-mail.  See www.campaign2000.ca for sample letters, concrete policy proposals, an
update on government initiatives to deal with child poverty, and how to reach your MP/MLA/MPP.

These are difficult days for many low-income people and many poor families with children.  Join us in offering a word of hope for the
poor that they have not been forgotten and that their neighbours do care.

Yours sincerely,

Working group of faith communities supporting Campaign 2000

Arthur Bielfeld | Greg Degroot-Maggetti

Campaign Against Child Poverty |  Citizens for Public Justice

(416) 595-9230   | (519) 576-2715

Dennis Howlett and Peter Noteboom  | Carly Steinman

Kairos: Canadian Ecumenical Justice Initiatives | Canadian Council for Reform Judaism

Canadian Council of Churches (1-877-403-8933)

“End Child Poverty Fast” September 27 - October 4, 2001" is organized by faith communities concerned about child poverty including, to
date, the Campaign Against Child Poverty, Canadian Council for Reform Judaism, the Canadian Council of Churches, the Catholic
Religious Conference, Citizens for Public Justice, Kairos, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Canada, the Presbyterian Church in
Canada, United Church of Canada.

 

OUR EVER-POPULAR KUDOS

Kudos this season go to...

Kitchener-Waterloo chapter of ARC (Aboriginal Rights Coalition).  In June, they organized one of the few, regional events to publicize the Blanket Train, the ecumenical campaign in which blankets were collected and then assembled at a rally on Parliament Hill to highlight the need for the federal government to settle Canada’s numerous native land claims quickly and justly.  Church and native
leaders spoke at the event, held in Victoria Park, Kitchener, which included, among other things, the reading of the June 3 CCCB statement, Land Claims Settlements B An Invitation to Dialogue and Healing.  Also present in K-W was the justice committee of Holy Rosary Church, Guelph.

The Catholic Rural Life Conference (CRLC) of London Diocese (with help from members of Catholic Rural Life, Hamilton).  They issued an EATING IS A MORAL ACT campaign, based upon a similar one developed by the national CRLC in the United States.  It’s a set of flash cards which illustrate the link between food that we put into our mouths and how it gets there.  They can be purchased for $1.25 per set by e-mailing crlc@rcec.london.on.ca

The CYO of the Diocese of Hamilton.  One of their activities for World Youth Day is a diocesan “No Sweat Campaign”.  While still in its formative stages, the students involved will encourage area schools to buy their team uniforms and similar items from companies that do not use sweat shop labour.  This way, diocesan high schools can be “sweat shop free” by the time the Pope comes to Canada in July, 2002.  For details contact the CYO at (905) 528-0011.

“As we are called to be Christ-like, we were also given animals as examples; remember that we are the only form of life on this planet that commits sin.  All the rest of creation, like Christ, was created free of sin.  Ecologically speaking, animals were created like us in all things but sin.  Perhaps we need to imitate the animals; and, in doing, become more Christ-like.”

-Naturopath John Pronk, St. Theresa’s Parish, Harriston, at the Jesuit Ecology

Project Retreat, Loyola House, Guelph, July, 2001

A(We) can in small ways break the commandment not to kill the planet but we do this in small, polluting ways until we produce our own
hell on earth.  Our sin process alters the evolution of the world leading to our own destruction.   The burning of forests leads to
storms, an example of the crucifixion of Christ.   We burn forests because of our loss of reverence.  We are told that native people
apologized first when they had to cut a tree down.”

-Peter Peloso, St. Mary Immaculate Parish, Elora, at the Jesuit Ecology Project

Retreat,   July 30, 2001

 

Don’t Forget!    

The Annual Challenge For Change Conference on AJesus, Hope & The Reign of God” at St. Peter’s Lutheran Church, Kitchener, Oct.19 (7pm)
to October 20 (5 pm).

and

The Annual Social Awareness  Retreat at Regina Mundi Parish, Hamilton, Saturday, December 1, 2001, on "ADVENT-- Waiting For What:
Presents or Presence?”

Details listed inside this issue under "Bulletin Board”!!!!