The Fourteenth Sunday after Trinity, 5 September 2021
Eldroth (Harvest*), Clapham
* CLICK HERE to download the Harvest Festival Service Booklet (pdf)
If a brother or sister is naked and lacks daily food, and one of you says to them, ‘Go in peace; keep warm and eat your fill,’ and yet you do not supply their bodily needs, what is the good of that? So faith by itself, if it has no works, is dead.
Supplying people’s bodily needs - it’s not been that easy of late. You’ll recall that massive tanker the Ever Given blocking the Suez Canal earlier this year, holding up so much shipping that it cost the world’s markets a boggling 9.6 billion dollars a day. Then there’s the current supermarket shortages due to the labour crisis hitting haulage firms. All this on the back of a pandemic which spread so rapidly through our global transport systems, and continues to impact them in sometimes unexpected ways.
On 11th August a cargo terminal at Ningbo-Zhoushan in eastern China was shut after a worker there was found to have been infected by the Delta variant of the coronavirus. Ningbo-Zhoushan is the third busiest cargo port in the world, handling (in normal times) somewhere around a billion tonnes of goods a year. The partial shutdown reduced the port’s capacity by a quarter. The commentator Nick Spencer wrote,
This story reflects the challenging times we’re living in: cargo mega-ports do not normally close because a single worker goes off sick. It might make you shiver to consider how an illness detected in a single person on the other side of the world could, it seems, retard and destabilise global trade patterns for weeks, possibly months. How extremely fragile we are. When everything is connected to everything else, problems over there — whether in Suez, Ningbo-Zhoushan, or Wuhan — became problems over here. We really are all in it together, for good or ill. This would not be a problem if we trusted one another, had reasonably aligned values, or had a robust sense of solidarity which could weather the everyday tribulations that come with trade. But we don’t. The paradox of the past 30 years is that, as the world has grown economically closer, it has grown politically apart. [1]
But that’s not the end of the story; for the good news is that throughout the world there are many people of faith and goodwill who are working hard to feed people in need today - and to point us towards a future when we may not be so dependent on the present global food supply system with its fragility and vulnerability.
I heard about a foodbank on the island of Mull off the west coast of Scotland who in spring 2020 received enough fresh fruit and veg to supply many of the island’s households with a good-sized bag-full. This fresh food came from the mainland because in those early days of lockdown most shops on the island were struggling to source enough fresh produce. This got some people thinking - and acting.
Thinking about the large amount of of green space available to them on the island, good for growing or grazing. Thinking about how locally-produced meat, fish, seafood, cheese, biscuits, jams, honey, wool, etc. are available at a fair price for what it takes to produce them, but are generally more expensive than many can afford as a norm, and aren’t produced in enough quantity if everyone did want to buy them. Thinking about how some of the ingredients used locally come from elsewhere, but could be produced nearby. Noticing how a little local veg is available for sale in season and a good number grow some of their own. Recognising how home-growing increased a fair bit during 2020. Seeing the huge potential for growing in the countryside. Noticing how around the country, box schemes are getting more popular, and various commendable initiatives are growing food specifically to supply foodbanks.
One of the island of Mull’s church ministers, Liz Gibson, is also a local crofter, and a grower of fruit trees, herbs and annual vegetables. She is now encouraging her fellow-islanders to grow more to sell at affordable prices. She says that
It’s not that long ago since most rural residents would have been growing a high proportion of their staple food. It was often a struggle and nobody would choose to go back to the hardship involved. But we’re at the other extreme. With the increased knowledge and support available we could turn the proportions around and produce most of our own food, while importing and exporting some treats. Why are we importing herbs from Africa which can be grown all year round in this country? Why are we exporting food which could be eaten closer to home? [2]
This Mull producer says that ‘if the global food supply system has served some well and provided employment, then a local food supply system can still do both these things, with a resultant drastic reduction in carbon footprint, in pesticides and fertiliser, in waste, in packaging and pollution; and a drastic increase in healthy soil, biodiversity, local composting, animal welfare, human health, satisfying work, planetary hope.’
This makes me wonder, which countries does my food come from? Could more of it be produced closer to home? Could even I, the least green-fingered man around, learn how to produce some? After all, our environment is similar in many ways to that of the Isle of. Mull. If we could do it, then why not do it? Could we pool our substantial resources, knowledge and skills to get together to make a difference in this way? [3] Is it possible for us to learn together how to ‘tread lightly on our planet, in harmony with nature. taking care of people and fellow creatures, making sure that we can sustain human activities for many generations to come?’ Is it possible for us to ‘create a culture change, not climate change’? [4]
So at harvest-time, we give thanks for the variety of food and drink we have enjoyed in our lives, and we are grateful for the hard work which has fed so many for so long, whilst we also acknowledge the cost of unsustainable production to so many people and to the planet itself. We realise with some humility and maybe fear, just how extremely fragile we are living with the shortcomings of the present industrial-scale globalised food economy.
May God inspire vision and grant us the courage we need to find different ways forward, learning from the past, excited for the future, caring in the present. May we encourage each other to have faith and sow some seeds, to bring life in its fullness for our brothers, sisters and all the world. [5]
Notes
[1] Nick Spencer, Frictionless trade has hidden costs. Church Times, 27 August 2021.
[2] Liz Gibson, Lectionary Reflections, 15th Sunday after Pentecost (B) in Kathy Galloway & Katharine M. Preston (Eds), Living Faithfully in the Time of Creation, p.17-19.
[3] Liz Gibson, op. cit.
[4] The Permaculture Association, What is Permaculture?
[5] Based on a prayer of Liz Gibson, op. cit.
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