EARTHKEEPING NEWS A NEWSLETTER OF THE NORTH AMERICAN COALITION FOR CHRISTIANITY AND ECOLOGY Volume Nine, Number One November/December 1999 Call To Action Adopt A New Global Ethic — Reduce Consumption The year 1998 was the hottest year on record. Global warming is definitely here. We see increasingly frequent environmental catastrophes around the globe. According to a United Nations report, new threats include a serious destabilizing of the global nitrogen balance. Huge amounts of nitrogen are deposited on land and in water through intensive agriculture and burning of fossil fuels. This could make fresh-water supplies unfit for human consumption. About 20 percent of the world's population already lack access to safe drinking water. Eighty percent of the world's original forest cover has been cleared or degraded, a quarter of animal species are at risk of extinction, and more than half the world's coral reefs are threatened by human activity. A grim picture for the 21st century! Who is to blame for this state of affairs? With Pogo, we have to admit that the enemy is us. Consumer demand drives the escalating power of business to control governments and legal systems, and abuse the natural world. Experts say if we can reduce overall consumption of the planet's resources by 90 percent, we can reverse the trends. It is good, but not adequate, to demonstrate against the expansion of the World Trade Organization's control over the nations. We have an obligation to change our attitudes towards ethnic, national and religious differences, and to reclaim Earth as our home. Only if we see Earth as our community will we be able to simplify our lifestyles, and reduce our massive overconsumption of Earth's gifts. Home     Table of Contents