The tip of the Iceberg

Icebergs are a common symbol of climate change: icebergs cleaving off glaciers, icebergs melting, a polar bear standing on a lone iceberg drifting out to sea. Do we ever consider what lies beneath?

The current climate conversation is just the tip of the iceberg. It doesn't delve deep; it has no weight to it. We talk in parts per million, chemistry, symbols (graphs and polar bears), statistics and acronyms - endless acronyms. But we are communicating in code - skating across the surface, so to speak. The statistical banter and alphabet soup (IPCC, ppm, CO2, G8, etc...) is the visible portion of something much larger.

I'm not drawn to climate action because I enjoy thinking about pounds of CO2 per gallon of gasoline or because I enjoy reading long-range transportation plans. As it happens, I do enjoy the subject matter, but that's not why I care. The dry portion is just much easier to articulate than the remainder of the iceberg, buried deep in dark water.

My passion for climate and environmental work is a spiritual passion. It emanates from my love of this Earth and all things in it - a deep appreciation for all life. This love bears with it a responsibility. Not a responsibility to "save the world," but a responsibility to try to maintain an equilibrium habitable to the genetic bounty I am a part of. A responsibility not to take up too much space. In many ways this is a selfish duty - I'm looking out for the world I love. I know perfectly well that in its absence another world would flourish on this same Earth. It wouldn't take long, from a geological perspective, to grow a new genetic medley as prodigious as our own. But I don't live in geologic time and neither will my children. Neither does any other sentient being who rises with tomorrow's sun.

And it's not just other species that concern me. We would be foolish to think humans exempt. Which brings me to another contour of the iceberg's belly. Last winter, the minister's wife at the Burlington Unitarian church gave a speech articulating her sense of God. She described God as arising from the connections and relationships between people - love and community. It is going to take many, many people working in tandem, bound by a love of each other and love of the Earth, to tackle climate change. By her definition, it will truly take an act of God - something I'd like to be a part of. Climate action offers an excuse to rise above our own selfish desires and become a part of something much larger, a community of beings working in concert for the good of all life. So, my passion for climate action is religious in nature. It is a calling - a challenge - to step out of and beyond our individual selves and achieve as a species what cannot be achieved alone.

There is more to the iceberg than I can currently articulate - lying in unexplored waters. But as an illustration to accompany the previous paragraph, I want to share a short video:

http://www.wherethehellismatt.com/