Judith Russenberger

Counting on …. Day 1.097

11th April 2023

As we celebrate the new life of the resurrection, here is a petition calling for life for our bee population.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/631948

Quotes from supporters of the petition:-

Professor Dave Goulson – Scientist, Author and Founder of the Bumblebee Conservation Trust

“For three years in a row our government has granted farmers special permission to use banned neonicotinoid pesticides on sugar beet. This is contrary to the expert advice of their own Expert Committee on Pesticides, who specifically recommended that permission should not be granted. It also flies in the face of a huge body of scientific evidence showing that these chemicals are phenomenally toxic to all insect life, and that their use on any crop contaminates soils, hedgerow plants, and nearby streams and ponds for years to come. We are in a crisis, with insect populations in freefall. It is about time our government woke up to this, and acted accordingly. This petition is a necessary means of holding the government to account. Please sign and share as signing will ensure the issue is debated in Parliament.”

Rev Professor Jasper Kenter, Aberystwyth Business School, Aberystwyth University

“The repeated lifting of a ban on extremely harmful neonicotinoid pesticides by the UK Government is doing untold damage to insects in the UK. It is short-sighted and not backed by evidence. The ecological, economic, and cultural value of protecting insect population is far greater than any short-term profits from allowing these pesticides. By signing this petition, we can force a debate on this issue and make sure these pesticides are banned again next year.”

Dr. George McGavin. Entomologist, TV Presenter, Author, President of the Dorset Wildlife Trust and Senior Principal Research Fellow, Imperial College.

Neonicotinoids are not a disaster waiting to happen – the disaster is already unfolding. These potent nerve poisons are extremely toxic to all manner of invertebrates and are water soluble – they get everywhere polluting soil, ground water and rivers. These chemicals, often used prophylactically as seed treatments, go on to make every part of the plant toxic. Neonicotinoids generate very large profits for the companies who manufacture and distribute them but they do enormous environmental harm and their use must stop.

Notes:

Globally 15% of crops are lost to ‘pests’ but the FAO tells us that 33% of all food grown is wasted. We need to get smarter – there other ways of protecting crops than poisoning the entire countryside.

Dose for dose neonicotinoids can be hundreds, even thousands of times more toxic to bees than DDT

Counting on … day 1.096

10th April 2023

Homes for all? Here is a simple petition asking that all new-build homes be fitted with a swift box. Places where swifts can nest, have diminished over recent decades and the lack of safe nesting places is contributing to the demise of these beautifully acrobatic birds.

https://petition.parliament.uk/petitions/626737?fbclid=IwAR0EC_OhRCKQVv7OSxCS1MrLdaXsdkIWju0Lljr_VG6kFQSu_DG1RzayY7s

Counting on .. day 1.090

3rd April 2023

Talking about the climate crisis, what worries us and what the solutions might be is important – whether it’s talking with friends and family, with church and social groups, with businesses and providers, with MPs and local councillors.

From the A22 Network a reports from Germany’s Letzte Generation: “Elsewhere, LG told mayors that their cities would be disrupted if they didn’t support our demands, creating a national discussion about whether this is justifiable. Our mayor said he didn’t want to be blackmailed, and instead wondered why we couldn’t just ask for his cooperation. So we did, without attacking him in any way, and he agreed.

“This is something we are hearing more and more. It feels like there are many more open doors than expected. We’re not there yet and there’s a lot more work to do, but I want to share with you the feeling that change is indeed possible since there are likely more allies than you think.””

Green Tau: a reflection on resurrection.

8th April 2023, Holy Saturday.

What is resurrection? Its literary meaning is to rise again or to reappear, and more particularly, to rise again from the dead,

In Greek the word is ‘anastasis’ which is also the title used for pictures depicting Christ ‘harrowing hell’. Between his burial on Good Friday and the empty tomb on Easter morning, Jesus is believed to have gone to the place of the dead – variously known as hell or hades – where he triumphs over death as a force of dominion. In pictures Jesus is shown breaking open prison doors or coffin lids, and reaching out a hand to pull out or pull free those trapped by death. Typically it is Adam and Eve who are the first people that Jesus resurrects. This story is called ‘the harrowing of hell’

It seems as if there is no resting in the tomb for Jesus on Holy Saturday, but rather there is the work of salvation to be done. Matthew’s gospel describes an earthquake at the moment of Jesus’s death which breaks open tombs and that in Jerusalem some of those who had died were raised and were seen by others. Perhaps time has a different speed or becomes a different after the physical death.

So again what is resurrection? Is it about new life as in completely new, or renewed life that is a remaking or reusing – or even re-membering – of pre-existing life. Is it reincarnation which implies being refleshed, or is it the born again of Jesus’s conversation with Nicodemus with the implication of a spiritual birthing? From the Old English æriste, the word is sometimes translated as again-rising, which to my mind has a nuance of a constant rising and rising and rising, like the waves of the sea. This latter is reflected in the constant cycle of birth and death in the natural world, the repeated recycling of atoms and molecules to maintain an ongoing source of flow of life – a river of life. Evolution is the name we give to describe the means by which life has appeared – and continues to appear – on earth. The raison d’être of evolution is to fill the world with life, despite what ever obstacles are set against this. In this sense evolution is similar to salvation, as both seek to ensure everlasting life.

Is resurrection just about the physical body? I hope not as the physical constraints of the universe we inhabit makes that impossible. The scope for ongoing life on earth relies on the ongoing recycling, reusing of atoms and molecules. There has to be a process of letting go that enables this.

In John’s gospel, Jesus tells his listeners, ‘Very truly I tell you, unless a kernel of wheat falls to the ground and dies, it remains only a single seed. But if it dies, it produces many seeds.’ (John 12:24)

Whilst one seed dies, its very existence is then enabled to continue and to flourish. There is an eternal continuum of life in the natural world to which Jesus is drawing our attention. We can see another view of this continuum, this everlasting life in the story of salvation. Every generation receives the story from its forebears and inhabits them in their own lifetime, before passing them on in a new retelling to the next generation. In each retelling the core character of God is constant – for each generation God is a living presence and each generation is alive in God. ‘in the account of the burning bush, even Moses showed that the dead rise, for he calls the Lord ‘the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.’ He is not the God of the dead, but of the living, for to him all are alive.” (Luke 20:37-38)

Resurrection is about the ongoing existence of life that becomes independent of its physicality. It is both about letting go and moving on, of dying and living, of death and birth, of former ways and new beginnings. Easter is a time for launching out on to the river of life, of catching the flow of the current, of being carried into a new era which has no finite beginning and not finite end but rather is eternal.

And this makes Easter a time for letting go of the past so that it can be reborn as a new future. It is about not clinging on to how things used to be, but reaching out to a new way of being. It is about being open to encountering Jesus in new ways, and being ready to follow him along new paths.

The climate crisis is one of the many obstacles that challenges the process of evolution, that disrupts the practiced cycles of the natural world. It is a first in terms of the scale to which humanity has been the cause of the disruption. But can we this Eastertide find in our re-entering and reimagining the resurrection story, find new ways being Christ’s people in this world, and new ways of being Christ’s agents sharing in word and deed the gospel of salvation?

What can we let go so that new resources are freed up to serve our brothers and sisters, to cherish and care for the natural world? How can we retell the stories of faith so that they are relevant to a new generation? How can we adopt new lifestyles that are sustainable, that support the common good? How can we find ourselves reborn again? Will this Easter be as transformative as the first Easter?

For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 1 Corinthian 15:22

Easter Day

9th April 2023

Reflection

It is not easy to understand what happened on that first Easter morning, to comprehend what happened when Jesus rose from the dead. Mary when she first discovers that the tomb stone has been moved, assumes that the body has been stolen – maybe by someone/ some group who wants to despoil his body. Many people considered Jesus to be a criminal, an opponent of the true Hebrew faith. Simon Peter and the other disciple want to check for themselves – are there clues that Mary has overlooked?

The discarded grave clothes and the folded head cloth don’t suggest grave robbers or people seeking revenge. But nor do they suggest a resurrection such as they had witnesses when Jesus had called Lazarus out from his tomb. Then it had been necessary for others to unbind Lazarus.

The writer says that the disciples believed but did not as yet understand. I wonder what at that moment they believed? Mary for her part still feels that someone has taken Jesus’s body away. She returns to the tomb, and despite the angels’s presence still fears someone has removed the body. It is only when Christ calls to her that she recognises what has happened.

Sometimes when we are in a dark place, when we are troubled or under stress, we find it hard to see God’s presence, to find anything to be happy about. We, like Mary, need to called, need to be told that we are loved. The joy of Easter doesn’t always come at the Easter vigil or at the Dawn service. Sometimes it doesn’t always come to us on Easter Day, but Christ is always there, loving us and caring for us and waiting for that moment when we are able to hear his voice.

The words from Jeremiah remind us that God’s love is endless, always seeking us out, always wanting to rebuild our lives so that we can be full of joy and contentment.

The essence of resurrection is new life, life that is renewed and restored, life that continues for ever in the everlasting flow of love and renewal that is the nature of God.

An alternative translating of Jeremiah from The Message

“And when that happens”—God’s Decree—
“it will be plain as the sun at high noon:
I’ll be the God of every man, woman, and child in Israel
and they shall be my very own people.”

* * *

This is the way God put it:

“They found grace out in the desert,
    these people who survived the killing.
Israel, out looking for a place to rest,
    met God out looking for them!”
God told them, “I’ve never quit loving you and never will.
    Expect love, love, and more love!
And so now I’ll start over with you and build you up again,
    dear virgin Israel.
You’ll resume your singing,
    grabbing tambourines and joining the dance.
You’ll go back to your old work of planting vineyards
    on the Samaritan hillsides,
And sit back and enjoy the fruit—
    oh, how you’ll enjoy those harvests!
The time’s coming when watchmen will call out
    from the hilltops of Ephraim:
‘On your feet! Let’s go to Zion,
    go to meet our God!’”

Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24

1 Give thanks to the Lord, for he is good; *
his mercy endures for ever.

2 Let Israel now proclaim, *
“His mercy endures for ever.”

14 The Lord is my strength and my song, *
and he has become my salvation.

15 There is a sound of exultation and victory *
in the tents of the righteous:

16 “The right hand of the Lord has triumphed! *
the right hand of the Lord is exalted!
the right hand of the Lord has triumphed!”

17 I shall not die, but live, *
and declare the works of the Lord.

18 The Lord has punished me sorely, *
but he did not hand me over to death.

19 Open for me the gates of righteousness; *
I will enter them;
I will offer thanks to the Lord.

20 “This is the gate of the Lord; *
he who is righteous may enter.”

21 I will give thanks to you, for you answered me *
and have become my salvation.

22 The same stone which the builders rejected *
has become the chief cornerstone.

23 This is the Lord’s doing, *
and it is marvellous in our eyes.

24 On this day the Lord has acted; *
we will rejoice and be glad in it.

Acts 10:34-43

Peter began to speak to Cornelius and the other Gentiles: “I truly understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him. You know the message he sent to the people of Israel, preaching peace by Jesus Christ–he is Lord of all. That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him. We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead. He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. All the prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

John 20:1-18

Early on the first day of the week, while it was still dark, Mary Magdalene came to the tomb and saw that the stone had been removed from the tomb. So she ran and went to Simon Peter and the other disciple, the one whom Jesus loved, and said to them, “They have taken the Lord out of the tomb, and we do not know where they have laid him.” Then Peter and the other disciple set out and went toward the tomb. The two were running together, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first. He bent down to look in and saw the linen wrappings lying there, but he did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb. He saw the linen wrappings lying there, and the cloth that had been on Jesus’ head, not lying with the linen wrappings but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not understand the scripture, that he must rise from the dead. Then the disciples returned to their homes.

But Mary stood weeping outside the tomb. As she wept, she bent over to look into the tomb; and she saw two angels in white, sitting where the body of Jesus had been lying, one at the head and the other at the feet. They said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping?” She said to them, “They have taken away my Lord, and I do not know where they have laid him.” When she had said this, she turned around and saw Jesus standing there, but she did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to her, “Woman, why are you weeping? Whom are you looking for?” Supposing him to be the gardener, she said to him, “Sir, if you have carried him away, tell me where you have laid him, and I will take him away.” Jesus said to her, “Mary!” She turned and said to him in Hebrew, “Rabbouni!” (which means Teacher). Jesus said to her, “Do not hold on to me, because I have not yet ascended to the Father. But go to my brothers and say to them, ‘I am ascending to my Father and your Father, to my God and your God.’” Mary Magdalene went and announced to the disciples, “I have seen the Lord”; and she told them that he had said these things to her.

Counting on … day 1.095

8th April 2023

Calling out injustice and being a prophetic voice has long been the vocation of the church. Now the Church is beginning to exercise this role in areas of the climate crisis. Christian Climate Action reports – “Former Archbishop of York and current Chair of Christian Aid, John Sentamu said: “Climate change is the greatest insidious and brutal indiscriminate force of our time. The people suffering the most have done the least to cause it. That is why continuing to search for new sources of fossil fuels, despite explicit warnings against this from the International Energy Agency, is such an offence against humanity. If we want to limit climate suffering we have to leave fossil fuels in the ground. The Church has a proud history of standing up against injustice and once again we need to see Christians calling on the Government to take decisive actions””

https://christianclimateaction.org/2023/04/05/john-sentamu-and-church-leaders-call-on-uk-christians-to-demand-an-end-to-all-new-fossil-fuel-licences/

Counting on .. day 1.094

7th April 2023

From the A22 Network a reports from Germany’s Letzte Generation (LG): “Elsewhere, LG told mayors that their cities would be disrupted if they didn’t support our demands, creating a national discussion about whether this is justifiable. Our mayor said he didn’t want to be blackmailed, and instead wondered why we couldn’t just ask for his cooperation. So we did, without attacking him in any way, and he agreed.

Counting on …day 1.093

6th April 2023

Calls for churches and other institutions, to divest from fossil fuel are inspired not just by the dangers of the climate crisis, but also by adverse affects on vulnerable people arising from inequalities and a lack of justice and local accountability.

“Rt Revd Ernesto Manuel, Anglican Bishop of Nampula in Northern Mozambique, said: ‘Fossil fuel investments increase climate change and impacts on those most vulnerable, and also destabilise communities. We have seen how over 700,000 people in Northern Mozambique have been displaced – many fleeing for their lives in terror from insurgents. Dozens have been beheaded, even children as young as 12. This violence only occurs in the areas where gas prospecting is taking place. Locals are not consulted and nor do they benefit, only suffering the impacts of rising prices, pollution and loss of land. We plead with the international community – take your money out of fossil fuels and invest in renewable energy which is decentralised, benefits local people and does not contribute to climate change.’” https://brightnow.org.uk/news/global-faith-institutions-divest-g7-cop26/

Counting on …. Day 1.092

5th April 2023

Ethical Consumer is investigating the labour rights of those employed in supermarket supply chains.

“Eight out of nine basic workers’ rights are being routinely violated in UK supermarket supply chains in Spain, our new report reveals. All major UK supermarkets are likely to source large amounts of fruit and vegetables from the Spanish regions of Huelva and Almeria, where workers’ rights abuses are widespread. Workers have been refused legal wages, sexually assaulted and harassed, fired for trying to join unions, made to work in unsafe conditions, had passports confiscated so they can’t leave, and been penalised for taking toilet breaks. Most workers are migrants.

UN special rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights, Olivier de Schutter, describes working conditions in the region as “horrific” and “inhumane”. He says, “I urge supermarkets to end their complicity in this abuse and address the issue head-on, using this report as their guide.””

If you would like to follow their campaign with a bi-monthly email, here is a sign up link

https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/ethicalcampaigns/agricultural-workers-rights-almeria?utm_source=ECRA+Monthly+Newsletter&utm_campaign=1afc7ec7e4-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2023_03_31_s&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_-5ea446b6bc-%5BLIST_EMAIL_ID%5D

Counting on … day 1.091

4th April 2023

On Sunday I joined with CCA and York’s local XR group in an action outside the Minster. With banners – “Love and Grief Earth Vigil” and “Creation Cries Out” – and leaflets and placards calling upon the Diocese of York to divest its fossil fuel shares, we gathered outside as the Liturgy of Palms took place (with two donkeys). Then we waited at west end, speaking with passers-by as other services carried on in the Minster, the Catholic Oratory and St Micheal’s in the Belfry. As the main congregation exited the Minster 9 people (and a dog) lay down on the ground, covered with sheets and each given a label stating the cause of death – highlighting the many ways in which the climate crisis is already impacting on people around the world and will continue to do so at an increasing rate. The atmosphere became somber and reflective and people asked questions and took leaflets as they made sense of the catastrophe we face.

If people have the facts, if people are told the truth, then they can act appropriately.