Susannah Tuttle, Eco-Justice Connection Director

The following sermon was delivered by Susannah Tuttle, Eco-Justice Connection Director, on Earth Day Sunday at Binkley Baptist Church. Click here to listen.

Everywhere we look in our culture, you will find plastic. It surrounds our food, it makes up our technology and it is a standard element in our household items. Unfortunately, it is also overflowing from our landfills, floating in our waters, and polluting our soil. More and more, you can even find it in our own bodies and those of other living creatures. There have even been traces of plastic found in breast milk. Despite the fact that we have learned the harms of plastics, we are steadily increasing our production of the material and integrating it into more and more items. 

Plastic is everywhere!  

One place where you will not find plastic, however, is in the Bible. 

How strange to think that something so ubiquitous to our world as plastic would be completely alien to our fore-parents in faith. At last summer’s Pastoral Care for Climate at the Duke University Marine Lab, Dr. Ellen Davis said that “we in the present-day Western world have more distance from the world of the Bible than any other culture in history.”

That’s not just in terms of time but also in terms of technology, attitudes, and disconnection from the non-human world around us.  

Justice for creation requires a rethinking of our relationship to plastics. 

Is it enough that we recycle and find alternatives to single-use items to reduce the amount of plastic that ends up in landfills? 

How do we account for the fact that plastics are often produced in historically oppressed communities so that their very production harms the health of Black, Brown, and poor White communities? 

Do we even have the means to remove enough plastic from our rivers, lakes and the ocean to preserve the bioregions made vulnerable by plastic waste?

If the Bible doesn’t speak of plastic, how should we people of faith do so?  

How do we address plastic’s impact on our health and the health of the living things around us from a theological perspective?

I want to share with you a poll titled:

Poll: People Want Action on Plastics for Health and Wildlife
New poll results show overwhelming public support for government action to address the plastic crisis, including a strong global plastics treaty.

Beginning April 23, for two weeks in Ottawa, Canada, 190 nations are preparing to meet for the next round of negotiations on an international treaty to address the global plastic crisis. 

In anticipation, a new national poll that the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) released on April 15th, 2024, shows that the public overwhelmingly supports a strong treaty that will reduce the production of plastic, eliminate the most toxic forms of plastic and toxic chemical additives, and increase public transparency on the production and use of chemicals in plastic. 

The poll shows the widespread concern of Americans across the political spectrum about the impacts of plastic pollution on drinking water quality, health, oceans, and wildlife. The poll’s results are good news for policymakers who are serious about addressing the plastics crisis, including via a strong global treaty. Some concerns are basic to just about everyone, with ensuring that there’s enough clean drinking water for themselves and their families being at the top of the list. Given that microplastics and the toxic chemicals they carry pose a very real and immediate threat to the purity of drinking water (a recent investigation found microplastics in 94 percent of U.S. tap water samples) and to people’s health, it’s no wonder that people want to see all levels of government address the problem.

NRDC’s poll results demonstrate that the public wants to see the United States take a leadership role in addressing the plastics crisis, including as part of the negotiations for the global plastics treaty. 

The question is: Will that leadership materialize in time for the upcoming round of negotiations in the next two weeks? 

To date, the U.S. Department of State has largely taken weak and unhelpful positions, serving more as a brake on achieving a meaningful treaty than ensuring that we get one. 

The chemical and plastics industries have continued to throw up objections to any treaty provisions that would have a meaningful impact on plastic production, decrease the toxicity of plastics, or increase transparency, while offering approaches—such as “voluntary” reporting on the toxic chemicals in plastic for example—that they know will lead to no real change. 

So what else is new? The issue isn’t whether the United States has the authority to support a strong treaty; it is whether the political will exists to ignore the chemical industry and their supporters, inside and outside of government, and instead listen to the public and prioritize their interests in clean water and a healthy environment. 

The theme of this year’s Earth Day—and the whole month of April—is the plastic pollution crisis. Now would be the ideal time for the administration, Congress, and state legislators to tune in to the public’s concerns and act on their behalf, by recognizing that we can’t recycle our way out of this crisis, rejecting the chemical industry’s so-called “chemical recycling” as the greenwashing of plastic incineration, and instead adopting production limits on plastic, banning most single-use plastics, and getting toxic chemicals out of plastic.

We Shall Not Want?  

Psalm 23: The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want.  He makes me lie down in green pastures; he leads me beside still waters (verses 1-2) 

Plastic, in both its production and its disposal, disrupts the pastoral image that the psalmist invokes. Still waters and green pastures are replaced with toxic chemicals and oil fields. Places like “Cancer Alley” in Louisiana could easily be considered the valley of the shadow of death. 

The well-known 23rd Psalm paints a picture of a world where those who trust in God are cared for, protected, and guided along life’s journey. The opening suggests a person who has, because of this relationship with God, found contentment. Note that much of the author’s contentment has some connection to the natural world: green pastures, still waters, a head anointed with oil, an overflowing cup, a well-stocked table.  

Perhaps what is lost in our plastic world is the recognition that the places that restore our soul are the places left untouched by human hands. 

Perhaps the invitation here is to recognize that creation gives us all that we need if only we are attentive to its gifts. 

Prayers of Gratitude

We know there is much to be thankful for, even in our plastic crisis. We acknowledge that plastic is a useful resource when used appropriately, as in many life-saving medical applications. We can also give thanks for the many people leading the way in tackling the misuse of plastic and uniting to take action to be good stewards of your Earth. 

Thank you, God, for organizations that fight tirelessly for the betterment of us all. Organizations that honor Indigenous voices and wisdom as they do the crucial work of making connections between these dangerous impacts on the human, plant and animal health and the fossil-fuel driven production of plastics in the region.

Thank you, God, for the thousands of people worldwide who take part in plastic-free efforts, reducing their own reliance on single-use plastic and encouraging others to understand the damage plastics are doing to creation and our global neighbors.

Thank you, God, for the new global plastics treaty negotiations that are taking place during 2023 and 2024 and the opportunity to tackle our plastic crisis as a global community.

Thank you, God, for people of faith for whom love of creation and care for God’s world is a core piece of their identity and who are using their creative gifts to reduce reliance on plastics and encourage others to bravely go against the flow of society standards.

We give thanks for all the voices working and praying for the day that will bring real change.  

Amen. 

Written words derived from Creation Justice Ministries Plastic Jesus toolkit.

On the week of International Women’s Day NC Interfaith Power & Light Director, Rev. Susannah Tuttle shares how women around the world are coming together with compassion and forgiveness, with curiosity and convictions, with expansive vision and a deeply personal call to action in response to the urgency of these times, by highlighting the Feminist Agenda for a Green New Deal and the responsibility of the world’s religions to affirm women’s dignity and human rights.

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We are living in very challenging times and many days it seems as though the world as we know it is completely falling apart. With compassion and forgiveness, I pray that the heartbreak we are experiencing is actually a soul-matter of renewing our faith through a process of breaking our hearts wide open so that we can experience even more love than we can yet understand during these very troubling times. I am grateful that we are able to come together in community and to know that the season of Spring will bring about a renewal of the universal lifeforce.

I am grateful for the invitation to share during the week of International Women’s Day. It is my intention to lift our spirits by sharing inspiration and information about current work taking place around the globe to advance Gender Justice ~ as a central part of Renewing the Heart of Our Humanity.

Many of you know that I, in my role as Director of NC Interfaith Power & Light, spend an enormous amount of my time working to bring about Climate Justice.  Although I have been helping to lead the theological conversations in North Carolina about the importance of Eco-Justice and caring for our Mother Earth for over a decade, it has just been in the past couple of years that I have been working with the U.S. Fair Shares Collaborative as a Faith Community Liaison. 

It is through this perspective on what the United States responsibility and accountability on an international scale is, that I have begun partnering with a women’s environment and development organization called WEDO – such a beautiful acronym – the W is for Women, the E is Environment, D is Development, and O is Organization – WEDO!

WEDO is a global women’s advocacy organization for a just world that promotes & protects human rights, gender equality and the integrity of the environment. Established in 1991 WEDO grew out of an extraordinary group of women, including Gloria Steinem, who started Women USA in 1979, and became the organization it is today through the vision of WEDO pioneers, Wangari Maathai, Vandana Shiva, and many others.

I don’t know about you, but when I find out that organization’s like WEDO exist – my heart grows three sizes larger!

WEDO’s organizational vision statement is: 

A just world that promotes and protects human rights, gender equality and the integrity of the environment.

Doesn’t that sound very similar to the foundational values of UU Principles?

Just imagine:

A just world that promotes and protects human rights, gender equality and the integrity of the environment.

Is this even possible? But of course! Anything is possible, if the heart of our humanity can be renewed.  The practical implementation question to ask is:

What conditions need to exist in order for this transition to be realized?

WEDO describes the conditions necessary as:

A world where: Leadership at all levels is diverse, representative, feminist and intersectional;

A world where: Policies center ecological health, human rights and gender justice;

A world where: Feminist solutions to creating a regenerative economy are implemented across countries and communities;

A world where: Fundamental human rights, including the right to food, water, land, housing, healthcare and education are universally realized;

A world where: Bodily autonomy and sexual and reproductive health and rights for all are fully achieved.

Sounds celestial, doesn’t it? 

I know I want to live in this kind of world, and I imagine you all do too.  So how do we get there? 

Divinity often comes in the form of threes. WEDO’s theory of change is designed as a three pillar framework: Moving Power, Moving Money, and Moving Minds.

One of the primary platforms WEDO has developed to make these moves possible is a Gender Climate Tracker App.

This is an incredible resource for any of us that have been trying to follow the very complicated Climate Negotiations at the United Nations… there’s an App for that! 

Since the Paris Climate Agreement took place in 2015, the global community has entered into a crucial phase where Governments, UN officials, and civil society organizations – of which faith communities are a part of –  now require tools and technical support to comprehend, track, translate, and intervene in global policy processes.

WEDO has helped to develop the Gender Climate Tracker App downloadable on your smartphone which allows everyone to become a part of what is happening on the global stage of decision making. 

With the ability to track the roles women are playing in international climate diplomacy and report on gender-specific progress in each country…

THIS is an opportunity for how we can all help to collectively bring about gender justice and renew the heart of our humanity!  

No doubt, we are living in an exciting moment for climate action and activism. 

Another very exciting resource WEDO invites us to participate in is the endorsement of the Feminist Agenda for a Green New Deal.

The energy around the Green New Deal has incited a national conversation around solutions to the climate crisis— solutions that are based in the real, systemic, transformative change that is needed to meet the scale of what science and justice demand. 

Movement leaders, activists, politicians, and academics are seizing the opportunity to shape the vision of what this systemic overhaul could look like, how it would happen, and who it would center.

In early 2019, WEDO joined a coalition of women’s rights and climate justice organizations came together in recognition that feminist analysis must be part of this discourse. The coalition includes WEDO, the Sierra Club, the NAACP, MADRE, the Women’s Earth and Climate Action Network – known as WECAN, and Grassroots Global Justice Alliance among others.

In a conversation focused on envisioning a healthy planet and communities, these groups knew that gender equality was-and is-key. 

Thus the Feminist Agenda for a Green New Deal was borne. This global coalition consists of individuals and organizations working towards justice at all of the intersections that the climate crisis touches: migrant justice, racial justice, economic justice, labor justice, reproductive justice, and gender justice.

Below is the opening narrative of the 10 Principles of the Feminist Agenda because I think it is some of the most profound language written about the climate crisis and what needs to be done to actually solve it.

“As a collective, we welcome the opportunity presented by the Green New Deal – and by the efforts of advocates and progressive policymakers – to secure rights-based policies and programs recognizing the global implications of US climate action and inaction. 

To truly address the root causes, as well as the scope and scale of the climate crisis, the Green New Deal must be cross-cutting in its approach, steadfast in feminist principles, and strive to combat historical oppressions. It must advance a transformative feminist agenda that centers the leadership of women, and acknowledges and addresses the generational impacts of colonization and anti-Black racism. It must end oppression against and be led and articulated by frontline, impacted communities – especially women of color, Black women, Indigenous women, people with disabilities, LGBTQIAP+ people, people from the Global South, migrant and refugee communities, and youth.

The climate crisis has emerged from interlocking systems of capitalism, resource extraction, labor exploitation, the commodification of nature, settler colonialism, imperialism, and militarism. It has roots in the exploitation of enslaved people, whose labor created wealth in the Global North, and of the continuing systemic racism that deepens and institutionalizes global inequity. 

To confront this crisis, we need coherence across policy sectors, from trade to military spending to development, to confront these interconnections. We must recommit to multilateralism and a democratic rule of law to build a policy architecture that can stabilize the planet and secure a just transition to post-exploitative economies.”

Yes, yes, & yes, WEDO.

Women and girls around the world are demanding and creating systemic change and a sustainable future for all. We need collective power to attain a just future – we need you.

For anyone who asks why feminism? Because at its core, feminism is simply belief in full social, economic, and political equality for women. Therefore, if you believe that women should have the same political, social, and economic rights as men, you are a feminist.

As a lifelong Unitarian Universalist, I join women of faith around the world working to create a world where everyone can thrive no matter their gender, gender identity or expression, or sexual orientation.

Together we are on the frontlines of faith communities committed to gender justice and I do this in part by lifting up the UU Principles’ “living tradition” of wisdom and spirituality which honor:

• The inherent worth and dignity of every person;
• Justice, equity and compassion in human relations;
• Acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth in our congregations;
• A free and responsible search for truth and meaning;
• The right of conscience and the use of the democratic process within our congregations and in society at large;
• The goal of world community with peace, liberty, and justice for all;
• Respect for the interdependent web of all existence of which we are a part.

These strong values and moral guiding principles are deeply connected to the principles of a Feminist Agenda for a Green New Deal and WEDO’s vision of A just world that promotes and protects human rights, gender equality and the integrity of the environment.

Here are the International Women’s Coalition 10 Principles for Engagement

As policymakers, advocates, and communities shape the Green New Deal, we must: 

• Require intersectional gender analysis across all actions.
• Recognize that there is no such thing as domestic climate policy.
• Confront institutional patriarchy and racism.
• Center Indigenous Peoples’ rights and leadership.
• Systemically confront exploitative and unsustainable production patterns.
• Advance reproductive justice.
• Ensure democratically controlled, community-led solutions.
• Reject false and harmful responses to climate change that fail to address root causes.
• Create regenerative economies that center systemic, feminist alternatives.
• Respect the leadership of young people as they fight for future generations.

Again, these actions and activities reflect directly upon what we say we value as progressive people of faith.  

In closing I will circle around to reminding us that March 8th is International Women’s Day. 

And to also remind us that as of today – the Equal Rights Amendment has still not been ratified in the United States. We are all being asked to imagine a world of gender justice, to affirm women’s dignity and human rights, and to renew the heart of our humanity. 

For the love of our Mother Earth and all her beloved children of all species… May it be so!

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*Susannah Tuttle, M.Div (she/her)
Director, NC Interfaith Power & Light | ncipl.org
NC Council of Churches Eco-Justice Connection | ejc.ncchurches.org
US Fair Share Community Liaison | usfairshare.org