Bert Hielema–Columns and Writings

Does the church still remember “semper reformanda?”

On a hotter than usual day for early June I was running on the Bruce trail in a cool tunnel of green growth. Tiny sun-spots made the dark path resemble a star-studded sky. I was thinking.

Physical exertion always lubricates my brain. My mind was busy with climate change, visualizing Eve and Adam at that tree, full with good fruit. I imagined them absorbing that bitter bite, and experiencing a world-altering event: climate change. They needed clothes not only because their thoughts had taken an erotic twist but also because flies, mosquitoes, bees, formally solely agents of pollination, were stinging them all over.

Climate change is more than temperatures rising. It also causes cancers and withholds wisdom, evident especially in political, ecclesiastical and financial circles. Take Perpetual Growth. Every day we hear economists and politicians, in unison, laud its miraculous merits as if a constant repeat will make it come true, and so lower deficits and create greater prosperity.

But… perpetual growth is impossible. These same people in essence deny Climate Change which necessitates fundamental changes as motor vehicles, all industrialization, generate CO2 , the hot weather maker.

I was there when Climate Change was debated at the Christian Reformed Church synod. It was a fascinating US congress-resembling  scenario. In other words I heard a lot of nonsense. The proposal passed with a reluctant majority: one vote on a minor matter went 98-68, a 40 percent disapproval. Earlier I had attended a combined delegate / young adult service. The singing there was interspersed with bible readings and a quote from the Belgic confession: “We know God first by the creation, as the universe is before our eyes like a beautiful book”, based on Romans 1:20 where it says that contemplating our wonderful world alone should convict us of God’s eternal power and divine nature. Believe it or not, creation is God’s holy primary word.

Once the communal part was over, the audience was asked to form small prayer circles. In my group were some important movers of the denomination. When I suggested that, based on what we all just had recited, creation too is God’s holy word, this was met with stony silence. Even though the bible and our songs – This is my Father’s world –   state that God made the cosmos which makes it holy, it’s much easier to ignore that part because it entails a drastic reversal of our daily doings, requiring constant forgiveness as driving a car or even switching on a light causes pollution.

Will the church ever make God’s holy primary creation-word an active part of the liturgy? Liturgy literally means “the work of the people.”  Has ‘semper reformanda’ become an empty slogan? Is the church still capable of ‘always reforming?” I love the church.  I am often moved to tears by the singing and praying (I am an emotional sob). By and large the sermons, based on God’s secondary Word, are mainly monologues of which only 10 percent is retained. Church services would be far more effective if the original meaning of liturgy was implemented, if preachers act as coaches to involve people, elicite testimonies, having them share practical energy-savings, food-growing tips, and walks in the woods to learn about God’s created word. With direct participation the learning index increases to 90 percent.

As a Christian community, in the prelude to the Lord’s return, we must unflinchingly face the current situation, and integrate scriptural insight with cosmic concerns, use the Bible as a lamp for our feet while becoming much more knowledgeable about Creation, God’s ever valid direct Word.

Frankly I don’t think church denominations can still change. At the CRC Synod I noticed that many are still caught up in the Greek philosophy of nature and grace, where the church is in the soul business and has nothing to do with stuff out there. It seems to me that changes are up to clusters of people – “where two or three are together” – or perhaps a “small is beautiful” congregation.

Reforming means a radical departure from the centuries’ old format of church services, which is losing appeal everywhere. Reforming means implementing what 2 Corinthians 5:17 tells us: “When we are in Christ the old has gone, the new has come.” That new is outlined in Revelation 21 which reveals a new creation – God’s holy primary Word – without a temple or church or synagogue or bible. I believe that we slowly must move that way, especially for the sake of the young people, many  of whom no longer feel at home with the current set-up. When we dare to worship in an integrated way, they will remain with us and even teach us a thing or two.

Bert Hielema lives in Tweed, Ontario, 200 km from both Toronto and Ottawa.

April 2012

Collapse

Collapse happens all the time. Come to think of it, the Bible starts with collapse right in the Garden of Eden, when the good life there suddenly turned sour. Both the Flood and the Tower of Babel triggered collapse, also happening almost overnight. The Bible also ends with it, when our present world order, Babylon, goes bankrupt.
God was directly involved in Noah’s rescue and in thwarting communication when humanity sought to dominate the earth by erecting a skyscraper. Later God started a hands-off policy – see Deuteronomy 32:20 “I will hide my face to see what their end will be,” heralding a drastic divine departure by allowing humanity to go its own way, thereby  acknowledging that mankind has come of age. This new approach is especially evident today in the re-built Tower of Babel, now in the form of the World-Wide-Web and Everywhere English.

Jared Diamond, a professor of geography in L.A. wrote a 575 page book simply called Collapse, subtitled:  How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. He devotes one chapter to Easter Island, discovered by Jacob Roggeveen on April 5 1722, Easter Sunday. There that globetrotting Dutchman saw something most astonishing, a landscape with huge stone statutes, but devoid of trees and inhabitants. Apparently the native religion required these immense images, which came at the expense of the native trees, used for transporting logs and scaffolding. Writes Diamond: ”What did the Easter Islander who cut down the last palm tree say? Like modern loggers, did he shout “Jobs, not trees!”? Or: “Technology will solve our problems, never fear, we’ll find a substitute for wood”? He also devotes a chapter to the Maya realm with flourished in Mexico from about 800 A.D. for some 700 years. A few weeks ago it was discovered that a 25-40 percent reduction in the rainfall – resulting in famine – was a deciding factor in Maya’s demise. Will an ultra-dry season in North America, the world’s bread basket, have a similar result?

Late last year Niall Ferguson in Civilization: The West and the Rest, confirms that civilizations do not rise, fall, and then gently decline. No, its shape is more like a steepening slope that quite suddenly drops off like a cliff.Harvard History Professor Ferguson, focusing on the Roman Empire, points out that it collapsed within a few decades in the early fifth century, tipped over the edge of chaos by barbarian invaders, internal divisions and energy shortfalls. In the space of a generation, the vast imperial metropolis of Rome fell into disrepair, the aqueducts broken, the splendid marketplaces deserted. The Ming dynasty’s rule in China also fell apart with extraordinary speed in the mid–17th century, succumbing to interior strife and external invasion. Again, the transition from seeming normalcy to anarchy took little more than a decade.A more recent and familiar example of precipitous decline is the 1989-91 collapse of the Soviet Union. And, if you still doubt that collapse comes suddenly, just think of how the dictatorships of North Africa and the Middle East disappeared last year. Twelve months ago, Messrs. Ben Ali, Mubarak, and Gaddafi seemed secure in their gaudy palaces. Here yesterday, gone today. What all these collapsed powers have in common is that the complex social systems that underpinned them suddenly ceased to function. One minute rulers had legitimacy in the eyes of their people; the next they did not. This process also happens quite often in financial markets.

We do well to reflect on our own situation. Don’t think for a moment that our present state of bliss is permanent. History suggests that one day everything smells like roses, the next day we experience a death spiral when the cozy familiar fades away like a figure in the fog.
With everything now having global implications, one catastrophic event – think bombing Iran or the banks owning up to their debts – could quite well result in a global commercial collapse and accelerate the coming of Judgment Day, when we all will appear before Jesus, charged with crimes against creation in whatever form, and especially guilty of greed, the root of all evil, both the result of us worshiping our very own idol: infinite growth in a finite world.

Jesus’ primary mission – and the church’s task as well- has always been the coming of the Kingdom, the New Creation, with the redeemed of the Lord as agents of organic innovation. (John 3:16-17). Since we have totally failed on that score, have actually done the exact opposite, the old has to go before the new appears: collapse has to occur. Welcome it.

Bert Hielema came to Canada in 1951, had an insurance agency from 1952-1975, sold out, moved to Tweed, took off a few years to become an accredited commercial appraiser, sold out again, and retired- sort of -in 1995.

March 2012

“The world is a dangerous place, not because of those who do evil, but because of those who look on and do nothing.”  – Albert Einstein

It is said that when a frog is deposited in a boiling pan, it right away jumps out, but when it is eased in warm water which then is slowly heated, it blithely burns to death.

I believe this little tale illustrates our society which in the last century has very gradually become addicted to fossil fuel, resulting not only in highly variable climate conditions but also in almost impossible challenges once the supply of finite oil is decreasing.

One of my (many) books is “Something new under the sun”, by historian J. R. McNeill. Its subtitle is: An Environmental History of the Twentieth-Century World.” In it Dr. McNeill writes: “In the last 100 years the number of people in the world has increased by an unprecedented 500 percent.” About energy he notes that: “No other century in human history can compare with the twentieth for its growth in energy use….. The world used 20 million tons of oil in 1900. In 1990 it was 3000 million,” 150 times more.

The consequences of both population growth and our ever expanding oil consumption are truly frightening. The result has been that our earth has contracted a form of leprosy as its skin is being stripped of topsoil; also deforestation and clouds of CO2 have given our planet a form of lung cancer, causing rapid hiccups in its climate, while our growing debts and deficits are deadly for its economy.

Since 2000 we have had extreme weather symptoms, evident in record high and low temperatures and in record high and low precipitation, all related to Global Warming, something Republican politicians deny it exists. Fact is that for the thousand years before 1800, carbon dioxide levels-which regulate climatic activity- remained around 280 parts per million (ppm). Due to industrial activity this ratio increased to 295 ppm by 1900, 310 by 1950 and 360 in 1995, and is accelerating ever faster. We are now experiencing the hottest years in history, and, although surface temperatures increased by only 0.6 degrees Celsius, even such a small increment is causing havoc in the weather.

We happen to live in a world where there is a finite supply of crude oil. No alternative source can provide anything close to the cheap, highly concentrated energy that petroleum provides. Sorry to repeat myself, but in the future we will have to live in a world almost entirely deprived of these highly effective energy sources.

Our use of temporary oil has pampered us into complacency and paralyzed us like the frog in hot water. Our world is extra dangerous because many Christians, who should be in the forefront honouring God’s creation, are among the most outspoken deniers of our air-contamination.  It reminds me of a saying by Luther, the church reformer:  “Sometimes the curses of the godless sound more pleasing to God than the hallelujahs of the pious!” I can well imagine a godless skier cursing when he sees a hymn-singing snowmobiler destroying his ploddingly prepared ski trail.

When we deny a problem we forfeit the future. Yet a different future is forming because soon the gushing of gasoline will be reduced to a trickle. Simply put, we, for the last few generations, have pursued the wrong narrative: we have lived the lie, have chosen the ‘broad way’ which C. S. Lewis called “the easy slope, no sudden turns, the smooth way to hell”. Unless we acknowledge our creation-poisoning, we cannot choose the future, which demands clean, green living.

Actually a shortage of fuel may be a good thing for us, because it gives us the opportunity to free ourselves from our addictive dependence on poisonous petroleum products. I know it can be done. I am old enough to remember how my grandparents before they had electricity were wise in the ways of the Lord. The Thirties in their rural west part of the Province of Groningen had pockets of god-fearing people: vibrant Christian communities where music, poetry, home entertainment were flourishing: yes, labour-intensive, but satisfying and environmentally responsible. Also the war 1940-45 has taught me that human beings are immensely adaptive. Unless we, as clusters of Christians, prayerfully ponder and pursue (ora et labora) ‘new creation-friendly’ ways, Greece’s present predicament provides us with a prognosis of what is to come.

Rereading my column reminded me of an e-mail I received a few weeks ago.

“Although lacking any real commitment to faith, I have found your blog to be both inspiring and in many ways reflecting my own views on life and the current state of the world.

I live in Edinburgh, Scotland, and would be interested in purchasing one of your books.  Obviously price and postage costs would influence my decision to buy, but I would like to know how much your books are, and the cost of postage to the UK. Many thanks for an excellent blog. “

Regards

Martin Smith

I may add that my blog – hielema.ca- received 30,627 hits in 2011. Your reply too is welcome at ‘bert@hielema.ca’

February 2012.

Our world today

“The old is dying and the new cannot be born: in the interregnum a great variety of morbid symptoms will appear.”

Antonio Gramsci, Marxist thinker

“I will make everything new.”

Jesus Christ, the beginning and the end.

We all have heard of the “Ten Lost Years,” from 1929-1939, usually labeled The Great Depression, which was more severe in the North America than elsewhere.

When this economic disaster started here, some 22 percent of the labour force worked on farms. Between 1929 and 1932 most of these jobs disappeared as agriculture became a victim of its own success thanks to better seeds, better fertilizer, better farming practices, and especially widespread mechanization, fueled by an abundance of cheap oil. The result of this accelerating productivity caused output to increase faster than demand, resulting in much lower prices. That, combined with a sudden influx of millions of surplus workers, changed the structure of the economy. It was this, more than anything else that led to rapidly declining incomes. Farmers then (like workers now) borrowed heavily to sustain living standards and production. Because neither the farmers nor their bankers anticipated the steepness of the price declines, a credit crunch quickly ensued as farmers simply couldn’t repay what they owed.  As a result the banks too became a victim of declining agricultural incomes, and thousands of them went belly up.

Then WWII war came to the rescue: the conflict with Germany and Japan revved up the industrial base and employed the millions of idle bodies, enlisting them both in the army and in the arms industry. Overnight the deep depression disappeared.

Fast forward to today. We now find ourselves in a similar situation as 80 years ago, courtesy ‘progress’ again, this time not through greater farm efficiency but through enhanced computer power, the software revolution, and the globalization of jobs, dispatching them to lower wage countries, China in particular.

For a while the reckoning was postponed as rapidly rising real estate prices, fueled by cheap money and cheating banks, created the illusion of wealth, until the housing bust came.

Economists blamed the debacle in the 1930’s on tight money, so this time the experts did the opposite: they poured trillions in to the banking system, without producing a cure. Bankers got their big bonuses, but the common folk kept on suffering.

Indeed, the old is dying, the new cannot be born, and a great variety of morbid symptoms are appearing. The USA now has 6.6 million fewer jobs than 4 years ago and 23 million would like to work but have dropped out. Also wages have been falling, and poverty is rampant.

What we are experiencing in 2012 is again a fundamental re-alignment of the economy. Just as 80 years ago the jobs of farm hands never returned – now 2 percent of the labour force produce more food than the nation can absorb – thanks to shipping jobs to Asia, and greater productivity, we again have a permanent surplus of labour.

Joseph E. Stiglitz, an economist at Columbia University, suggests that in the   current situation the best solution is to concentrate on two fields for the jobs of the future: education and health, expanding the service economy well beyond the current 70 percent. At the same time this Nobel Prize winner suggests that we better prepare for a much lower living standard.

Making the service sector bigger is easier said than done. In the USA already 17 percent of GDP – Gross Domestic Product – is spent on health care – more than in any country – with a very low success rate. The same holds true for education. The vested interests in both fields are just too difficult to dislodge.

My proposal is different. It is plain that the old order is dying. In 1939 war was the cure. That is no longer an option – even though some Republicans would like to attack Iran. The only way to heal our situation is to make peace with the physical world by imagining the new creation to come. Bonhoeffer starts his 200 page Creation and Fall (dealing with Genesis 1-3) with these remarkable words, “The church of Christ witnesses to the end of all things. It lives from the end, it thinks from the end, it acts from the end, it proclaims its message from the end.”

The Greek word for ‘end’ is telos. Jesus in Matthew 5:48 tells us to be ‘telos- minded’ – “be telos-minded as I am telos-minded “- (teleios is the Greek word there), which really means that now already our life must reflect the ‘perfection’, the ‘whole-ness’ of the New Creation.