While I encourage prayer and study, it is consequential action that will bring us to the realization of our hopes for the healing of creation. Would our turning away from endorsement of pleasure cruising, by advertisement and participation, not constitute a significant practical and symbolic step in the direction of our hope?

I would be very pleased to hear our moderator, or someone who understands her position, comment on the environmental and social implications of pleasure cruising. What is it doing to our coastal waters and our spiritual vitality?

Our Moderator seems more concerned with the environment than the future of the UCC.

This spring there were major decisions being made by the General Council to cut programs and staff, and we were told it was not possible to hold consultations with Presbyteries or Conferences. The Moderator was invisible in all of those discussions. Now the Moderator is travelling across the country by train to raise awareness about the environment.

RevJamesMurray, perhaps becoming known for defending the environment is the future of the UCC? Such an identity would make a much stronger impact in the world than much of what we are doing today. In my mind this kind of outward orientated activity and witness is really where the church needs to go, instead of just focusing on our survival all the time.

I agree.

Now I have to go read about the Spirit Express.......

Okay, I just looked at the Spirit Express site. I notice the town hall meetings are between Northern Ontario and Edmonton/Calgary area. Will there be a way to have face to face town hall meetings in other areas of the country? Perhaps a bus tour across Canada (Greyhound) would be in order too?

James was not downgrading the enviornmental issues - in fact his church has that has its agenda as well as the well being of ottawa and the world.  His point is survial is crucial to care of creation - how do we energize so we care for creation?  It is a good question and his church will be a location for an event in Nov on a a spirituality for the sake of creation ( nov 12 to 14)

Thanks, Pan. I am all for us being a voice for the environment. I just feel frustrated that the moderator only speaks about that topic, and remains silent while our denomination is going through some profound shifts in structure and direction. Can she not speak on both? Can she not integrate the two? Does her ecological theology not have an ecclesiology? Or does her silence say she doesn't care about worshipping communities of faith?

Where, in all of this, does ethical consideration come into play?

My persistent point being a refusal of the United Church of Canada to integrate precept and practice. How can we, ethically, endorse pleasure cruising while praying for plankton and stumping for healing of the waters?

After the failure of Copenhagen our moderator called us to bold, creative and courageous initiative in the service of justice. Martin Luther King Jr. was cited, among others, as an exemplar available for emulation. We were called to consider taking costly responsibility in the enterprise of justice seeking.

The United Church of Canada wants to live on both sides of the boundary keeping empire from kingdom. It just cannot be done. Called to the gospel we are called to risky work. At least that is what I hear in the testimony of the prophets, apostles, saints and martyrs.

Send a clear message to the bankers and their politicians. We are withdrawing our endorsement of status quo.

As the sign and seal of this intention, our national magazine, the Observer,  is seeking release from its contractual obligations specific to Craig Travel, understanding that it is not possible to serve both God and money.

A small side bar: To whose world are we being invited by this ad? May we enter that world if we do not possess plastic number cards?

I well know many environmental activists and associations of activisits. The United Church of Canada would recover much lost relevance by this one costly prophetic act. That gain would be compensated by substantial loss on the revenue side.

There is no lack of wisdom adequate to our circumstance. We suffer a lack of resolve and a failure of nerve.

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I'd be for that too RevJames. But overall I'm excited by the Moderator's vision of recognizing the environment as one of the most important moral issues of our time. But I wouldn't go as far as to assume she doesn't care about churches just because the environment seems to be her passion. I think that's a positive thing about the UCC today.

Who's endorsing "pleasure cruising"? Not me! ...Golfing either.

Hi NewLeafMinistries....

The United Church Observer endorses pleasure cruising.

You speak of moral concern. What would be your ethical concern where a national religious institution, in the person of its duly appointed moderator, seeks healing of the environment while profiting by promoting the environmentally and spiritually destructive practice of pleasure cruising?

Well, I'm not sure if the Moderator herself endorses pleasure cruising one way or another. I do know that the United Church at all levels has practices and behaviours which are not great for the environment and are contradictions in what we might expouse (as do the vast majority of Canadians). My policy is that every little bit of good one can do helps.

"My policy is that every little bit of good one can do helps."

Thanks NewLeafMinistries, mine too!

Why else search with all diligence to bring forward a contradiction that is costing us much. Let us overcome the contradiction by vacating the money economy to inhabit the neighbour economy. We will of course continue to make use of money. It is the squandering of money that we will refuse. 

This could become possible if our leadership would stand forward to declare themselves friendly to God; with the implication that this sets them in an adversarial relationship with money.

As clever stewards we will of course make use of money. In this we will be very cautious, as Frodo is cautious, concerning the seductions of the globalizing marketplace and the assimilation of our energies to fuel the engines of production and consumption.

Mardi has accepted a symbolic role by covenanting with us to be our moderator. Could she not make known her awareness of our complicity in the increasingly futile attempt to serve God and money, by the example of the Observer's advertising policy?

 Show us the conviction, the passion, the courage! Show us the way!

We are much wearied with much talk.

 I don't expect to hear or see Mardi in her quest. There hasn't been a train out of Owen Sound since 1995 and a passenger train since 1990. The tracks were torn up fifteen years ago, as a result of abandonment orders. There is a lot of Canada like that... 

 GeoFee, I agree that pleasure cruises aren't the best use of church money (but on the other-hand, if God looked at all the frivilous things I personally spend money on, then I'm in no position to judge!!!). I just don't think this should be laid on the Moderator. Isn't the Observer an independent organization? It should be up to their leaders to consider this question.

The work that the Moderator and others in the UCC are doing to raise the issue of environmental concern is important, though it may be simply symbolic it may awaken some people who never really thought that this might be a concern for Christians. I have big hopes for an environmental-orientated church in the future that openly acknowledges that the issues we face environmentally are critical issues for the same humans we seek to save.

I bang my head against a wall. I'm sitting with a retired farmer who is struggling over with whether to allow a lease for a wind turbine on her property. That will go a long way to make a hard life a lot easier and enable a non-poverty retirement years. And I live close to one of the largest nuclear power generation complexes in Ontario. There is a plan to move some low level radioactive scrap through my city for recycling. Do I hear anything from my church on either of these issues? ....[crickets]  

There are no trains in this part of the country. tracks were removed a long time ago. We depend on hydrocarbon fuel for everything here. That can not and will not change in the forseeable future (the next 50 years).  [crickets]. 

 Hi DKS, These issues (or similar ones) are certainly being faced all around the country. Are you part of the United Church? If so, maybe you want to raise them yourself? (Or maybe you just did, hehe.)

I can say the same here. While it is very nice that the moderator is travelling by train across Canada, Edmonton to northern Ontario is only a small part of Canada. What about the rest? What about those areas not serviced by train? She could hop a freight train and cover this area.......

 Hi Gang,

In defense of the Moderator she spoke at Waterford United Church's official re-opening on September 19.  I would not characterize her sermon for the afternoon as being environmentally driven.   The environment, or to use our own jargon, "respect for creation" is something the Moderator is known for if that is all we appear to hear from her we might do all a favour and consider that appearances can be deceiving.

Which is not me saying that the office of Moderator is above critique.  The train is rapidly becoming the horse and buggy.  While it may move tonnes of material about North America its presence in much of Canada is the stuff of legend.  I live on the Windsor/Montreal corridor in Brantford.  If it weren't for the several passenger trains running daily there would be very little traffic on this section of line.  I cross several railbeds converted to biking/hiking/walking trails two or three times a day just traveling around my pastoral charges.

Wind farming looks like it is becoming the next farm saving crop in the tobacco belt.  I don't think many on my pastoral charges are looking to the church to say something.  They have been sounding warnings for ages now.  What they really would appreciate is somebody listening.  Preferrably somebody with the ability to do something about what they might hear.

Grace and peace to you.

John

So essentially she'll be visiting less than a quarter of all of our provinces and territories.

At this time, yes. The Moderator's term is divided equally between the conferences (or at least the time they spend is divided equally). I have no idea how this actually divides out. I do know that Toronto Conference gave up its remaining Moderator time so she could be in other conferences. The Moderator was at the Annual meeting this year. 

Those are the remainder of an extensive network of rail links which ran across many parts of rural Canada, hauling raw materials for consumption in larger centers and distributing manufactured goods and services to the hinterlands. High cost of maintenance and low fiscal return wrote the death writ of those rail lines, never to to be seen again. In your area, John, many of those rail lines were also Canadian subsidiaries of American railways, who, for tax reasons, used a Canadian shortcut from Niagara Falls to Windsor to carry high priority freight.  The lines ran as straight as a die and were true high speed corridors in their day.

I don't think it is fair to criticise the Moderator of the UC for doing 'something'.  It is all any of us can do, that tiny bit of 'something'.  She may wake up a few more people to act in their own small ways.

I know many people who fly to exotic places for holidays.  I don't do that.  I know  many people who drive bigger cars than is necessary.  I don't do that.  I know many people who create piles of trash every week. I don't do that.  I know many people who go camping with a mobile home, complete with all the conveniences.  I don't do that. 

Are all those people 'evil'?  Not tomy mind.  Just not truly aware of the consequences yet.  The Moderator may help them to think about there behavior choices.  However, my little bits of 'respect for creation' doesn't heal the planet.

I have no desire to lay this or any other matter on the shoulders of any particular person. It is we who bear the burden of responsibility, each of us and all of us. Above I suggest the moderator, who has chosen to walk in the shoes we have offered her to wear, has opportunity to speak frankly concerning the ill that now besets us. She herself has affirmed this in various blog enteries in the past year.

It is my position that we are caught in the trap of double-mindedness noticed in the epistle of James. We want to have it both ways and this is impossible. We cannot hold to the traditions of possessive individualism and the tradition of the gospel. Where the former prevails the later languishes; as we now languish. Is that not what we heard in the gospel this past Sunday?

Why will our called and appointed public spokespersons not speak plainly about the habits and practices by which our hopes are frustrated and negated?

It ought no longer be about blame, about who is on the right and wrong side of the equation; the knowledge of good and evil by which we are laid low. Just as you say, let us do what we are able to stir to conscious thought the deep intuitions and inclinations now at work in and through all creation.

Just as the moderator has opportunity to shift attention from status quo to emergent remedy, so do you and I. For this reason, in season and out, I press to make clear the ethical dilemma at work near the very centre of United Church of Canada consciousness and commitment.

While changing from incandescent to fluorescent light bulbs makes a tiny shift possible, it is a change in deeply rooted bias to modernity that presents the real challenge.

In my denomination I don't think such a train would fly. It would be viewed that the money spent on such a thing would be far better used to evangelize to lost souls. We care about the environment, sure. We care about the eternal fate of human beings more.

Jae, you are so, so so......HOLY.

Yes, I know. And thank you.

Enlighten me, why is a train more eco friendly than a hybrid car?

Flying trains are not improbable enough to make your list of beliefs?

I'm not sure what Mardi hopes to accomplish, as I don't see how Mardi has much pull outside of UCC circles.  I suppose it can't hurt.

I am grateful for the lively conversation taking place here, exploring the paradoxes that we as Christians must embrace and work through. Our work is prayerful, concerned for community, and for all of God’s creation.

I describe my theme work as moderator in terms of invitation to participate in God’s abundant wholeness and healing of soul, community and creation. And God knows we need healing of all three!

Community is church and more. I trust that we each continue to do what we can as gifted and limited people, every day in response to Christ’s call.  Because there is indeed abundance in community. The gospel is full of illustrations of how a little can become a lot in community.

Thank you for naming how we tend to try to hold onto both possessive individualism and the tradition of the gospel. Church community is where we work through this tension together, finding new ways of faithfulness, constantly helping one another understand what we each need to let go of and what we each need to embrace in order to live with greater integrity. And what we communally need to let go of and embrace.

We certainly need one another’s help to live with integrity. We as United Church people say we are called “to live with respect in creation.” I look forward to the ways in which conversation here and elsewhere will contribute to a deeper sense of integrity of intention and action.

One of the few formal expectations given to the role of a Moderator is that he or she will “travel widely through the church” including formal visits to each conference. I’m making most of my conference visits by train (“Conference” is the church’s council of organization between presbytery and General Council and is in most cases known by geographical region), in part to make a point about carbon costs.

I should acknowledge here that VIA has graciously contributed the cost of this train travel, so the church is actually spending fewer dollars than it would with other forms of travel – but I’m not sure that the dollar cost is the most important point. I think we will all have to learn more about the true costing of travel and other human activities, once we take into account the toll on God’s Earth. Some things that look like bargains today will turn out to have been foolishly wasteful tomorrow.

During these conference visits I’m also listening and discussing matters of concern beyond the ecological. Moderators are fundamentally concerned about heartening and strengthening the whole United Church. I will continue to blog and tweet about much more than Town Hall conversations and caring for creation.

 This page will, though, be the primary place for discussion about these and there’s been a great deal of enthusiasm expressed for Town Hall meetings to share our concern and hope in relation to healing of creation. I hope I may see many of you there – and here, in ongoing conversation.

Peace and grace to you in our abundant life in Christ!

Good question.

David Suzuki offers good travel tips re: air travel vs. train and car travel here: http://www.davidsuzuki.org/what-you-can-do/reduce-your-carbon-footprint/...

If time allowed, I'd likely choose to travel by bus. Because time is limited to fulfill my responsibilities throughout the church, members are also offsetting the carbon footprint I will necessarily make on their behalf as moderator, and letting me know what they're doing with emails to: offsets@united-church.ca

There's more about that on elsewhere on the Spirit Express page...

Provocative and good questions and comments as always.

Just to clarify... I will be visiting for at least six days in every conference who wants such a moderatorial visit (all of them as I recall.) My travel to conferences in year one was largely by plane and car, as it will be in year three. Year two allowed for travel by train and car. The essential difference is that I will be travelling to communities from train stations by car, rather than from airports by car. Consequently, my carbon footprint will be reduced in year two. If time allowed, bus would have been even better.

I'm grateful for all of those who are stepping up to neutralize my footprint related to my travel on their/your behalf. The good people of St. Paul's United in Kinderseley Saskatchewan were the first to step up enthusiastically last fall with huge offsets due to changes they'd decided to make to their church building.

Let's keep listening to one another with humility and speaking with courage in all of the conversations that need to take place for the sake of God's beloved church and God's beloved world. As people who know God's love in Christ, we're compelled to do no other.

Fortunately, we're given the option of electronic conversations such as this as well.

Mardi, while VIA Rail is to be commended, I have to ask "at what price?" I know that to accept a commercial gift over a certain value places me, as a pastor, in a potential ethical conflict. Does this gift pass the ethics test?

Hello Moderator, thank you for your comments. Church community is important, I agree. I also think that it is very important to "hold onto ...the tradition of the gospel" or as I would say, to spread the Good News of Jesus Christ.

Strange, your opening comments to this post seemed to suggest that you were addressing everyone who was participating in this dialogue. Now this comment about "We as United Church people." Surely you realize that everyone here is not a member of your United Church of Canada.

They are? Ah well, so much for the seperation of church and state. At any rate, this is good news. I will have to share this information with the President of the denomination I belong to. If VIA will pay for you to tour Canada, surely they will spend equally for the leaders of other denominations.

Peace in Christ. 

My concern is with the nature of the learning we have in mind? The mass media is now structuring green consciousness at the level of brand presentation. It is beginning to seem that we may purchase a new heaven and a new earth, if we follow the leading of those whose primary concern is with the world of money.

Stephen Harper has declared himself accountable before God, but his effective commitments indicate the priority of money. And, the Christian  community is silent. This is scandalous for the whole spectrum of doctrinal bias and commitment. It is tragic for the United Church of Canada, which has a stated commitment to seek justice and resist evil.

My partner and I chose the United Church of Canada as our place of religious service. For my part there was a great admiration for the cover story; our mythology. I served on the board with friends at the Stella Street mission in Winnipeg's north side, an enterprise dating to the days of J. S. Woodsworth. I was well read in the traditions of dissent and non-conformity which gave rise to the best of the United Church.

Looking back I see the faces of so many wonderful persons who gave themselves in community with Barbara and I; everywhere we went in the land. Whether tiny Meadow Lea or grand Shaughnessy Heights, we found persons ready and able to support and encourage us along our way. My affection for those persons does not keep me from looking clearly at our shared compromise of the gospel. This most often leaves me on the far edge of the conversation.

There is an organic web of relations in the land. That web is being informed by the unconditioned freedom of God hovering over and moving through the confusion of our day. In every place, persons of all kind are being motivated to radical new decisions. Bob Marley has a wonderful phrase for this, "Exodus, movement of Jah people." While each must make the decision alone, we are altogether caught up in the possibility of healing and renewal given as the promise of our gospel. The earth will hear us singing: "In loving partnership we come!"

Here is my question to the conversation partners: Our national magazine advertises pleasure cruising to fund publication: does the economic gain justify the ethical cost? 

Hi Jae,

As a Baptist I cannot believe that you appear to have no clue as to what the political doctrine of the separation of church and state actually means.

The political doctrine stems from Thomas Jefferson's letter to the Baptists of Danbury who were concerned that the Constitution of the United States of America did not have jurisdiction at the state level.  In the letter, Jefferson wrote:

VIA Rail providing courtesy transportation to the Moderator of The United Church of Canada is not the government making a law which establishes or prohibits the free exercise of religion.

So lets get this straight.  Your denomination wouldn't do this because they would rather spend their own money spreading the gospel.  They; however, have no problem spending other people's money on what they perceive to be unimportant activity.  Is that what you are trying to say?

Grace and peace to you.

John

Thank you for the history lesson, rev, most informative. Now do you think that the governmnent-funded VIA rail ought to be supporting one denomination or religion over another? Not I.

What's fit for the goose is fit for the gander. Besides which we'd be using the money for the most important task of evangelism.

Peace in Christ.

Jae, you're a Baptist version of the "Debbie Downer" SNL character who walks in on conversations with the effect of reducing everyone around you to tears of frustration.

Hi Jae,

You should have sat with the history lesson a bit longer.

How is VIA Rail supporting one denomination over another?  To make that allegation you would have to know that it has refused to do the same for Chair of the Fellowship of Evangelical Baptist Churches in Canada.

How VIA Rail came to offer this to the Moderator of The United Church of Canada is information I am not privy too.  Nor am I aware that they would not extend the same generosity to the Chair of the Fellowship of Evangelical Baptist Churches in Canada.

It is fair for you to hold the opinion that VIA Rail should not be offering free rides to anyone.  It is unfair to the point of bearing false witness to suggest that VIA Rail is showing favouritism.  Unless of course you have proof that the Chair of the Fellowship of Evangelical Baptist Churches of Canada approached VIA Rail with the same plan to travel that the Moderator has and was denied.

So the answer is yes then, your denomination wouldn't spend its own money on a train tour and it would have no problem using tax payer's money for the same purpose.  That makes your earlier outrage appear to be simple pettiness at best or blatant hypocrisy at worst.

Grace and peace to you.

John

Oh c'mon rev. Do you honestly believe VIA is offering to pay the way across Canada for the leader of each and every religious organization? I highly doubt that you do. I highly doubt that they are. If they were, I'd start my own demonination today. Clearly some favoratism is being shown here to the UCC. I'd be interested in learning the religious affiliation of those who chose to cough up the cash for your Moderator's little trek across Canada.

I'd also be interested in learning just how she is travelling. Just how much of my hard-earned tax money is going to support a religious leader who I do not. Is she going by coach and sitting up all night, or going first class and enjoying a bed in sleeper class. Are her meals from the snack car or the dining car. Somehow I suspect the latter in each case. If so, rather than associating herself with the common folk, she is travelling with the elite which may not serve best to sponsor the church community she claims she wants.

revjohn, here's what I believe is happening: your moderator is using Canadian tax money (much of it gotten from people who aren't UCC or even Christians) to enjoy a leisurely luxurious train trip across our fair land. Nice job if you can get it.

Hi Jae,

Which is not the point I was making.  

The point I made was that we do not know how it came to pass that VIA Rail made the offer.  Did The United Church of Canada approach VIA Rail for assistance?  Did VIA Rail hear about the trip and decide to offer some assistance as PR?  What do you know about it?  At present I suspect that you only "know" as much as the rest of us "know" and you are inventing the rest.

Without proof the best you can come up with is gossip.

Once the money is in VIA Rail's hands it becomes VIA Rail's money just as if I were to attend any congregation of the Fellowship of Evangelical Baptist Churches of Canada and place my tithe in one of their offering plates it would become that congregation's money to use as they see fit.

How much money does your Congregation receive via the GST rebate in any given year Jae?  How much of that hard-earned tax money finds its way to your denominational coffers after being taken from others who may not support your religious leader or your denominational mission?

Again, it seems that you are not outraged so long as you are the beneficiary.  

Instead of making insinuations that feed your suspicions you could politely (I don't think I am assuming to much of you in that regard) ask the Moderator to answer the questions.

I get that is what you believe.  I also get that it is not what is known.

Now, you can continue to function as if your belief is "truth" or you could make inquiries to find out how close your belief might be to the "truth."  You could also continue to insinuate that the Moderator is robbing Canadian tax-payers blind, something which is patently not the case.

If you want to argue that VIA Rail never should have made any kind of offer to any kind of religious leader to defer costs go right ahead.  I doubt that you will find any here who strenuously disagree with that as a practice.  I can see a potential PR benefit to making such an offer to religious leaders I have no way of knowing whether or not the advertising message will be worth VIA Rail's effort.

Which is one reason why I don't work for VIA in their PR department.

Grace and peace to you.

John

You should live in Sri Lanka where all the trains have compartments marked "Clergy Only".

You know jae you are a jerk. I've said it before and I'll say it again "JERK".  ( CH wipes tears from eyes) See, chansen and I can agree.

I wonder what an invitation to conversation means when some questions are not admitted for consideration.

Is there not one person in this place willing and able to give a brief commentary on  the ethical implications of advertising pleasure cruising while advocating for the healing of creation?

From another angle, can we practice stewardship of creation while practicing conspicuous consumption?

George what is about cruises?  The observer has lots of ads which we can ignore - and there are other travel options - which again we can ignore or buy - is this a crusade?  I mean in the term of crusades.

No, this is not a crusade. I am simply trying to get one case study, indicative of a general compromise between the calling of the gospel and the invitations of political hedonism, on the table. Why is it not possible to look at this matter in the same way we would look at any other matter bearing ethical implications?

I hold the view that cruising and other forms of high-end holidaying seem out of sync with what I understand the gospel message to be. However, as I have been told in other contexts, The United Church Observer is not under editorial control by the UCC so it's hard to see how the moderator can be held responsible for The Observer's choices.

Well asked, GeoFee. Excellent questions.

What about the Moderator's own advocation of pleasure cruising, if she is indeed travelling across Canada via first-class train service.