Reflections of a Peace Intern

I was on a flight from Texas to Florida that was taking a short pit stop in New Orleans. I wasn’t even getting off of the plane, but I found myself craning my neck and leaning across the empty middle seat to take a look out the window. Instead of looking for the blue dots of swimming pools or the familiar brown and green of baseball diamonds, I was looking for oil—lots of oil spilling across the gulf. When I couldn’t see oil, I found myself feeling disappointed. I had to do some serious self-examination to understand why I felt disappointed that I wasn’t getting a firsthand aerial view of one of the greatest environmental catastrophes of my lifetime.

It occurred to me that my interest in seeing the oil spill was not unlike our culture's fascination with violence as entertainment. We see violence in our movies, television, and video games and we cannot seem to get enough. Only this isn’t fiction--it's real life. Oil in the gulf is destroying plant and animal life, horribly and permanently disrupting ecological systems, and ruining the economic well-being of those gulf residents who relied upon gulf fishing or gulf tourism for their economic security. It makes a pretty good horror story.

All of this was weighing heavily upon my heart as I headed for camp in Florida--the camp at which my campers would be most directly affected by the oil spill. What I found there was a lot of anger and apathy. I heard some say that they cared about the oil spill only because it might potentially ruin their vacation to the beach. I heard many more express deep resentment toward BP for the spill. Acknowledging that BP's behavior has been poor, to say the least, and resisting the urge to rant about corporate greed and responsibility, I instead tried to push campers to explore how their own small, individual actions combined with the small, individual actions of millions of Americans to create a very big problem. We need to keep in mind that BP is a corporation fulfilling consumer demand. As a nation, we continue to demand oil at increasing rates because we refuse to give up or even reduce the use of our cars. We cannot get past the marketing ploys that convince us that every drink of water needs to come from an individually sealed, plastic water bottle that has been shipped from all ends of the earth instead of from the glasses and faucets that we've already paid for and can reuse. Campers struggled with this and they're not alone--we all find it easier to blame BP than to actually examine and change or own lives.

I hit a lot of barriers that week and discussing the oil spill with Florida campers had not been as nuanced or thoughtful as I had hoped and expected. Being that it was week three and I was exhausted, I was ready to throw in the towel. But on my final day of camp, something changed. The day before, Thursday, my small group went canoeing and had a great time. We floated the river and saw alligators, fish, plants, birds, and monkeys. We linked our canoes together and did Morning Watch (morning devotion) as we floated down stream in a 6-canoe block, thanking our Creator for the sun, the water, the air, the animals, and the community. During small group time on Friday, we debriefed the canoe trip. I hadn't even intended to make this a platform for environmentalism--I had been unsuccessful so far that week, I was tired and frustrated, and I figured the campers would be more interested in talking about the three canoes that flipped than our responsibility to be good stewards of the earth. But one camper handed me a golden key by insightfully mentioning that he was awestruck during the trip when he realized how much life could be seen on the river. BINGO. This launched a wonderful discussion of how a relatively small river could sustain so much--the fish, the birds, the plants, the alligators, the demonic monkeys, and (oh yes!) US! Did you see? Could you believe? Can you just marvel at how intimately, delicately, wonderfully and fearfully our awesome God has created our world? Yes, we all need one another, from humans right down to the tiniest of insects. Creation is a fascinating balance and we have abused the trust that God has granted us to care for, protect, and maintain that balance. The Gulf Oil Spill is a huge breach, but it begins with the little breaches that we all commit on a daily basis. Maybe we could all make only one trip to the store this week. Fill up our Nalgene bottles. Take a walk. Stop and wonder at the beauty that is our world and give thanks! If God says it is good, then surely so should we.

“God saw all that God had made, and it was very good.” (Genesis1:31)