Business World Makes Space

EARTHKEEPING NEWS
A NEWSLETTER OF THE NORTH AMERICAN COALITION FOR CHRISTIANITY AND ECOLOGY

Volume Seven, Number Three
March/April 1998

Business World Makes Space For Spirit

by Kathleen Joyce

It was an exciting, spirit filled week as we met people with similar concerns from the far corners of the earth, shared stories, experienced synchronicity and celebrated life in many wonder-filled ways. Keynote speakers were Peter Russell, Hazel Henderson, Riane Eisler and Oscar Motomura. Presenters and participants included business people, from global to local; consultants; health practitioners; and those in the "business" of spirituality, including a Navajo shaman.

Michael Stephen, international CEO of Aetna Insurance, began his session with "We are coming out of the closet – we can honor and celebrate spirituality as part of our lives. Finally, we can use the G– word."

Oscar Motomura, a consultant and founder of the AmanaKey Company in Brazil, has trained thousands of managers in a program to re-empower the subjective, invisible components of the "bottom line." Several Brazilian companies today prepare a Social Balance Sheet showing how they impact society.

Hazel Henderson began by defining economics as currently taught in our schools as a "form of brain damage." Our economic models leave out the "cultural creatives", the 40% of the population that has begun to live out of a different model, the "integral culture." This hidden "Love Economy" (families, care givers and volunteers across the globe) is missing from the GNP but comprises trillions of dollars worth of value. Henderson suggested shifting taxes from income to the sins of overconsumption, pollution and waste, to allow companies to move toward more socially responsible practices.

This conference was about making explicit in the world our growing concern for the integration of spirit and work, body and soul. We shared stories, methods and practical steps we can take to make space for spirit. It was about hope, and discovery and responsibility for our future.

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