Friday, June 25, 2004
is this fair?
Does this mean that blogsphere promotes only a faux-friendliness that hides a real individualism? asks Tim, wondering why so few people responded to my kiwi~mission~diet:
Steve’s recent appeal for volunteers to adopt a cheaper diet for a week, and donate the difference to mission, did not fall on deaf ears. COMMENTS and Maggi’s extensive musings demonstrate that we read his post. Yet as I write, I’m away from Internet access on a three day writing retreat, no one has volunteered to join Steve. (Still haven’t publicly as far as I can see!)
Like others I was stirred by Steve’s appeal, so why did we not act?
PS I am not looking for strokes, nor am I in the least grumpy at folks. I am just dropping Tim’s comment into the consumption around the dinner table discussion.
)
reason #1 – people are weary of joining things. so ‘commit’ to this feels like joining yet another thing that takes our time and energy.
reason #2 – (my reason) – i already do this. in fact, we buy very little meat, and we shop at the stores where you pay a lot less, but have to bag your own groceries and only have one non-brand to choose from.
we’ve lived like this a long time. at first, it was from necessity. now it’s because we don’t want to spend more than we need to, cause there’s always better places for your money to go.
Comment by tammy — June 26, 2004 @ 1:17 am
for me. steve, the most hopeful and exciting thing is not how many people joined your family on the ‘diet’, but how many people began to asses what they were doing in terms of supporting global ecological issues, hunger and fairness, wasted resources…
I can’t say how much money has gone to alleviate hunger through your campaign. But I know for sure that quite a number of households across the globe have taken from you, Lynne and co., the inspiration to reassess what we use, what we waste, and what we give back. (Households who have no idea what pizza-burgers or polonies actually are… !!!) In those terms you should definitely be feeling glad that you have led people into good things this week. Well done, and thanks for stirring us up.
Comment by maggi — June 26, 2004 @ 7:20 am
Some good comments. Most of us do live extravagant lives whilst others go without the basics neccessary to live. I am a Salvationist and one of the things we do personally, is one a year Salvationists in Western Countries like ours give one weeks wages to support work in developing countries. We call it our Self-Denial Appeal. The pleasing thing is that most Salvationists in fact do this. It is amazing how God blesses you when you sacrifice for the sake of others. It is amazing how we can actually survive minus one week’s salary.
Bless You All
Comment by Glenda — June 26, 2004 @ 11:01 pm
Steve, we eat like this every Tuesday night and sponsor a child with the money we save. The kids call it “poverty night.” I have found that being more aware means we eat simpler more often. I have a great Mennonite cookbook called “More with Less Cookbook.” There are also great web sites, for those of us in the US, on local farming co-ops and local producers. This is not the kind of discussion you will fin din most North American churches, it is an important one!
Comment by anj — June 30, 2004 @ 2:51 pm