Show me, Dear Lord, What Breaks Your Heart
Annie Birdsong
heart.
Then, in certain classes at the University of Maryland,
I was introduced to the readings by leaders who awakened me to new
realities.
Below are excerpts from one of these leaders, which I cut and pasted
from an article in this month's Resurgence Magazine.
I introduce you to Vandana Shiva, a recipient of the Right Livelihood
award who thrills me with her love for the good earth and people -- but
also shows me what breaks God's heart.
THE GIFT OF FOOD
By Vandana Shiva
"THE FIRST THING to recognise about food is that it is the very basis
of life. Food is alive: it is not just pieces of carbohydrate, protein
and nutrient, it is a being, a sacred being. Not only is food sacred,
not only is it living, but it is the Creator itself, and that is why in
the poorest of Indian huts you find the little earthen stove being
worshipped; the first piece of bread is given to the cow, then you are
required to find out who else is hungry in your area. In the words of
the sacred texts of India, "The giver of food is the giver of life,"
and indeed of everything else. Therefore, one who desires wellbeing in
this world and beyond should especially endeavour to give food.
"Because food is the very basis of creation, food is creation, and it
is the Creator. There are all kinds of duties that we should be
performing with respect to food. If people have food it is because
society has not forgotten those duties. If people are hungry, society
has rejected the ethical duties related to food.
"The very possibility of our being alive is based on the lives of all
kinds of beings that have gone before us - our parents, the soil, the
earthworm - and that is why the giving of food in Indian thought has
been treated as everyday sacrifice that we have to perform. It is a
ritual embodied in every meal, reflecting the recognition that giving
is the condition of our very being. We do not give as an extra, we give
because of our interdependence with all of life.
"One of my favourite images in India is the kolam, a design which a
woman makes in front of her house. In the days of Pongal, which is the
rice harvest festival in South India, I have seen women get up before
dawn to make the most beautiful art work outside their houses, and it
is always made with rice. The real reason is to feed the ants, but it
is also a beautiful art form that has gone on from mother to daughter,
and at festival time everyone tries to make the best kolam as their
offering. Thus, feeding the ants and works of art are integrated.
"The indica rice variety's homeland is a tribal area called Chattisgarh
in India. It must be about fifteen years ago that I first went there.
The people there weave beautiful designs of paddy, which they then hang
outside their houses. I thought that this must be related to a
particular festival, and I asked, "What festival is it for?" They said,
"No, no, this is for the season when the birds cannot get rice grain in
the fields." They were putting rice out for other species, in very
beautiful offerings of art work.
"Because we owe the conditions of our life to all other beings and all
other creatures, giving - to humans and to non-human species - has
inspired annadana, the gift of food. All other ethical arrangements in
society get looked after if everyone is engaging in annadana on a daily
basis. According to an ancient Indian saying: "There is no gift greater
than annadana, the giving of food." Or again, in the words of the
sacred texts: "Do not send away anyone who comes to your door without
offering him or her food and hospitality. This is the inviolable
discipline of humankind; therefore have a great abundance of food and
exert all your efforts towards ensuring such abundance, and announce to
the world that this abundance of food is ready to be partaken by all."
"Thus from the culture of giving you have the conditions of abundance,
and the sharing by all.
"IF WE REALLY look at what is happening in the world, we seem to have
more and more food surpluses, while 820 million people still
go hungry every day. As an ecologist, I see these surpluses as
pseudo-surpluses. They are pseudo-surpluses because the overflowing
stocks and packed supermarket shelves are the result of production and
distribution systems which take food away from the weak and
marginalised, and from non-human species.
"I went through the food department of Marks & Spencer the other day,
and I went dizzy seeing all the food there, because I knew that, for
example, a peasant's rice field would have been converted into a banana
plantation to get luscious bananas to the world's markets. Each time I
see a supermarket, I see how every community and ecosystem's capacity
to meet its food needs is being undermined, so that a few people in the
world can experience food 'surpluses'.
"But these are pseudo-surpluses leadingto 820 million malnourished
people, while many others eat too much and get ill or obese.
"LET US SEE how food is produced. To have sustainable food supplies we
need our soils to function as living systems: we need all those
millions of soil organisms that make fertility. And that fertility
gives us healthy foods. In industrial cultures we forget that it is the
earthworm that creates soil fertility; we believe that soil fertility
can come from nitrates - the surplus of explosives factories; that
pest-control does not come out of the balance of different crops
hosting different species, but from poisons. When you have the right
balance, living organisms never become pests: they all coexist, and
none of them destroys your crop.
"The recently released report of the Food and Agriculture Organization
has chart after chart to show how in the last century we increased food
productivity. But all they really calculated is labour displacement.
They only looked at labour productivity - as how much food a human
being produces by using technologies that are labour-displacing,
species-displacing and resource-destroying. It does not mean that you
have more food per acre; it does not mean that you have more food per
unit used of water; it does not mean that you have more food for all
the other species that need food. All of these diverse needs are being
destroyed as we define productivity on the basis of food production per
unit of labour.
"We are now working on technologies, based on genetic engineering,
which accelerate this violence towards other beings. On my recent trip
to Punjab, it suddenly hit me that they no longer have pollinators.
Those technologically obsessed people are manipulating crops to put
genes from the Bt toxin (the soil bacterium Bacillus thuringiensis)
into plants, so that the plant releases toxins at every moment and in
every cell: in its leaves, its roots, its pollen. These toxins are
being eaten by ladybirds and butterflies which then die."
See the full article by Dr. Vandana Shiva at:
http://resurgence.gn.apc.org/home.htm
SheBlewHimDidYouBlowHim
let's see, not being able to MURDER the entire planet like he did during the
time of noah.
"Annie Birdsong" <annieb...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:1110159132.6...@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
George
suffering including babies and children because He wouldn't tell us the
secret of anti-biotics? What a bastard!
"Annie Birdsong" <annieb...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
news:1110159132.6...@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
Dore
news:1110159132.6...@f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com...
> heart.
ALL EVIL and sins.
--
Dore
"Annie Birdsong" <annieb...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
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