Friday Nudge: Locate Yourself

As I prepare a talk for a globally diverse group of Christian leaders, I invite us all to take the time to locate who and where we are.

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Friends, I am getting very excited as I prepare for a trip to Jakarta, Indonesia to participate in an Economics, Ecology and Theology Consultation that we, the Climate Justice Core Group of the World Communion of Reformed Churches, are hosting! We have invited theologians, economists, church and community leaders, youth, and others from around the world to join us from October 18-22. The goal is to “produce a theological statement on Economics, Ecology and Theology that will undergird the work of the decade for climate justice of the WCRC. We also hope to work towards the production of resources for our churches.”

Please pray for us as leaders from around the world travel varying distances for this important in-person meeting, and that we are able to discern what the Holy Spirit wants us to convey, as a global body, to our churches and to the world.

I promise to come back with stories and lots of pictures!

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As I prepare the talk that I will be giving at the meeting, I am trying to remain aware of my own particular location as a white Christian settler (on unceded Indigenous land) from the global North. I will be speaking to a globally diverse group of Christians from within the Reformed tradition of the Christian church, and so my particular effort is to be aware of the place in which I am located culturally, socio-economically, theologically, and spiritually. I will endeavour to open my mind and heart so that I can hear, and be transformed by, the words and experiences of others. This is critically important for us to do, especially those of us from dominant cultures and traditions. In light of the climate emergency, there is no better time than now.

Call to Action: Locate Yourself

This Friday’s call to action is to invite you to locate yourself. Who and where are you? I invite you to ask yourself who and where you are in the following contexts. These questions are just a few possibilities out of many; if you have others you can ask them for yourself, as well as add them to the comments section. I invite you to go outside into your favourite natural place with a journal or notebook and write your questions down.

What other questions can we ask about who and where we are?

Questions

• Where are you from, and where do you live? How did you arrive here/there?

• What watershed do you live in? What are the native flora and fauna of that place?

• What language(s) do you speak? What is your mother tongue? Do you still know or speak your mother tongue?

• What religion, if any, are you from, either culturally or religiously? What is the dominant religion of the place in which you live or come from? What is the cultural-religious history of that place?

• What socio-economic class would you describe yourself in? What is the story of being there? Has it changed over time? To what extent is it part of your identity?

• What level of education do you have? Did you incur student debt to get it, or did the prospect of student debt, inability to get a loan, or other financial factors keep you from getting the education you desire(d)?

• What colour is your skin? What is your gender? Your sexual orientation? To what extent do these realities make it easier and/or harder to move through the world? How do they relate to your socio-economic class? What intersections do you notice?

• How does the climate crisis impact you and your loved ones? Directly and/or indirectly? Has that changed over time? How? How are you or your loved ones likely to experience the climate crisis as it worsens?

• We all have biases, as well as blind spots. There are the things we know, the things we know we don’t know, and the things we don’t know that we don’t know! Can you, in reflecting on the questions above, think about where some of your own biases or blind spots might be, and make a commitment to educate yourself or learn more? Doing so can be discipleship in action.

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