Christians...good stewards of the Earth
Every Tuesday and Thursday mornings at 10am, I walk into the largest lecture hall on campus excited about the coming hour. I sit, I listen actively, I take notes, and I record the lecture in fear of missing a few words or sentences that the professor might share.
10 minutes ago, I finished listening to my last lecture. I can still feel my blood rapidly translocating throughout my body (not b/c of an earlier hotpot meal) but b/c of conviction from what I just heard- the Human Population, Can we feed everyone?
My writing this is not intend to play everyone for a guilt trip. My intention is to inform. I realize that most of us feel very disconnected when topics of world hunger are brought to surface but it is my plea that you read this. I also realized that living in a North American society, we are fed so much information- to the point of information overload (I hope this will be different). We all know about suffering, about world hunger. We’ve all seen sad, starving children on television from less developed countries, “eliciting” us for money. And our response…simply change the channel to find something more exciting. I know I do it way too often. And I think to myself, as 20 year old mainlander, chocolate loving girl, what can I possibly do? Pray? Ofcourse…but what else? Sponsor a child? Give money? Okay…sure…but at the end of the day what rights have I really surrendered? Don’t I go back to eating my nice carnivorous meals? Driving my nice fossil fuel burning car? and print my many pages of notes for class? and flush my toilet “x” number times a day each time I take a leak that is about a few cubic centimeters in volume? The answer is a shameful yet resounding YES!
In following I attempt to share the statistics that proved this issue to be a burden. I will also offer an idea- something that we can surrender. And lastly I will add a reason to doing so than just simply for the better of the environment.
- Most of us have probably heard that 5% of the world population consumes more than 30% of the world resources. You and I are in that 5%.
- If everyone on earth RIGHt NOW were to consume resources you and i do, we would need 3 planet Earth’s in order to sustain it…hence our lifestyles ARE NOT SUSTAINABLE! Although that's only a hypothetical situation, think of how fast consumption rates in places like China is growing- everyone wants to have a car, do what we enjoy...
- At this point with all the food made, the world has enough to feed EVERYONE (6.4 billion ppl) with sufficient calories and a handful left over. It’s not politics that keeps us from doing so, it’s asymmetry! It’s our lifestyles. By the way things are going on, in 20 years, we won’t be able to say these words b/c there won’t be enough food to feed all the mouths.
- 790million ppl are on the verge of starvation1.2billion are chronically hungry. Suffer from insufficient calorie intake
10 minutes ago, I finished listening to my last lecture. I can still feel my blood rapidly translocating throughout my body (not b/c of an earlier hotpot meal) but b/c of conviction from what I just heard- the Human Population, Can we feed everyone?
My writing this is not intend to play everyone for a guilt trip. My intention is to inform. I realize that most of us feel very disconnected when topics of world hunger are brought to surface but it is my plea that you read this. I also realized that living in a North American society, we are fed so much information- to the point of information overload (I hope this will be different). We all know about suffering, about world hunger. We’ve all seen sad, starving children on television from less developed countries, “eliciting” us for money. And our response…simply change the channel to find something more exciting. I know I do it way too often. And I think to myself, as 20 year old mainlander, chocolate loving girl, what can I possibly do? Pray? Ofcourse…but what else? Sponsor a child? Give money? Okay…sure…but at the end of the day what rights have I really surrendered? Don’t I go back to eating my nice carnivorous meals? Driving my nice fossil fuel burning car? and print my many pages of notes for class? and flush my toilet “x” number times a day each time I take a leak that is about a few cubic centimeters in volume? The answer is a shameful yet resounding YES!
In following I attempt to share the statistics that proved this issue to be a burden. I will also offer an idea- something that we can surrender. And lastly I will add a reason to doing so than just simply for the better of the environment.
- Most of us have probably heard that 5% of the world population consumes more than 30% of the world resources. You and I are in that 5%.
- If everyone on earth RIGHt NOW were to consume resources you and i do, we would need 3 planet Earth’s in order to sustain it…hence our lifestyles ARE NOT SUSTAINABLE! Although that's only a hypothetical situation, think of how fast consumption rates in places like China is growing- everyone wants to have a car, do what we enjoy...
- At this point with all the food made, the world has enough to feed EVERYONE (6.4 billion ppl) with sufficient calories and a handful left over. It’s not politics that keeps us from doing so, it’s asymmetry! It’s our lifestyles. By the way things are going on, in 20 years, we won’t be able to say these words b/c there won’t be enough food to feed all the mouths.
- 790million ppl are on the verge of starvation1.2billion are chronically hungry. Suffer from insufficient calorie intake
posted by A Mandar @ 3:22 a.m.
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