Passivity to Citizenship
By Debra Rienstra
Eco-theologist Debra Rienstra, author of Refugia Faith, was one of the presenters at Third Act’s Climate Justice Camp, which was held in July in conjunction with the Wild Goose Festival in Union Grove, North Carolina. At our request, she is graciously sharing her presentation, revised for our publication. To read more from Debra, follow her at debrarienstra.com and refugianewsletter.substack.com.
WILD GOOSE FESTIVAL, JULY 13, 2023 — As we become more deeply aware of the scope, urgency and complexity of the climate crisis, it seems to me we can take one of four postures. Maybe there are more. Here are the ones that seem to me most common.
“They’ll think of something.”
I’m actually fond of this one because it reminds me of my mother, now of blessed memory.
Mom and Dad lived through the Great Depression, came of age during World War II, and arrived at the threshold of adulthood in the 1950s, the “age of excitement.” They were ready for prosperity and progress, and as white Midwestern Americans, they got it. Upward mobility, the American Dream — the whole bit.
So whatever big, intractable problems came up in conversation, Mom expected some expert somewhere to figure it out. “They’ll think of something,” she would say.
And why not? To some extent, she was right. Humans are enormously inventive. We do think of something. In Mom’s day, it was polio vaccines and microwaves. Today it’s COVID-19 vaccines, solar panels and electric vehicles. So “They’ll think of something” is somewhat true — as long as the problem is mainly technological.
“God will fix it.”
This one drives me crazy. It’s the sort of thing that an older gentleman will say to me after I give a talk on climate change. He will inform me afterward that he is not worried because “If it gets really bad, God will intervene. God is sovereign.”
This is meant to sound pious and reverent and trusting. And actually, I don’t disagree that God is sovereign. However, it’s pretty clear that God does not intervene in a great many terrible things. At least God does not sweep in and fix it all, and … there! All better! That is not what sovereignty means.
I’ve finally come up with a snappy comeback to the older gentleman’s piety. “Well, sir, it is already really bad. And God is intervening — through other people. Why not you, buddy?” I’m usually much nicer about it.
You can probably see immediately that the problem with Postures 1 and 2 is that they both participate in the “infantile authority fantasy.”
“Infantile authority fantasy” is a term that describes our common human longing to surrender ourselves to some authority figure who will solve all our problems — some hero — so that we can regress into a comfortable, infantile state of passivity and dependency.
Wouldn’t that be nice? I do understand this impulse. I really do wish God would sweep in and fix everything. I even pray for that, just like the Hebrew prophets did: “Rend the heavens and come down!”
However, we have to be careful about that infantile authority fantasy because it can easily become “hopeium.” Hopeium is that dangerously addictive drug that makes you feel better for a minute but does nothing to solve any underlying problems
“We’re doomed.”
The opposite of hopeium is doomism. My husband was fishing with an old friend last week — I’ll call him Tom. Out there in the fishing boat, trolling along on a small inland lake in Minnesota, they talked about climate change. And Tom declared that there is no point in doing anything about it because the problem is too big, and too bad, and there is no way people will do what we have to do in time, so just… never mind.
Obviously, we should have some problems with this one.
First, it’s just not true. We will never go back to the way the earth was 50 years ago, or even 20 years ago. But we can definitely make a big difference in how bad things get. And we must.
Second, Tom has grandchildren. He has no business giving up.
Third, giving up is an expression of privilege. Tom is a middle-class American guy in the middle of Minnesota. He’ll most likely be OK even if he lives another 30 years. His grandchildren? Not so much.
Probably all of us have days when we say to ourselves, “They’ll think of something,” or “Surely God will fix it,” or even “We’re doomed.” We waver between hopeium and doomism. And that’s OK. It’s only natural. But as we vacillate, I would challenge us to try to get the needle to hover most of the time right over a fourth posture.
“I have called you friends.”
This is what Jesus says to his disciples at the last supper, the night before he dies. Check out the Gospel of John 15.15. The disciples are eating together, Jesus is washing their feet, Jesus is praying for his disciples. And at one point he says, “No longer do I call you servants, for a servant does not know what their master is doing; but I have called you friends.”
Friends! People too often imagine God at the pointy top of some great cosmic pyramid of power, and we are the helpless serfs groveling at the bottom. Our job is to worship and fear and be helpless and obedient.
But evidently, God does not ultimately want serfs. God wants friends, reconciled friends. This is a marvel. In orthodox Christian theological terms: God’s redemptive work for all creation means that through Jesus’ death and resurrection, God calls us into a circle of friends. We are not supposed to be squashed at the bottom of a pyramid. We are supposed to be fellow citizens in a resurrection community.
That means we are called to agency and responsibility. We are called to join with all our hearts in God’s work in the world. And of course, we resist that because it’s hard! We may find this calling difficult, costly and frightening. We might prefer to run back and hide under the pyramid.
So how do we do it? How do we act as friends of God? Well, we need the Wild Goose, and we need each other. The Wild Goose is that aspect of the Holy Spirit that disturbs. The Wild Goose gets us off our duffs by messing up the status quo and prompting us toward new things. Well, we’re dealing with a whole world of disturbance right now.
What is the Wild Goose leading us to do? And who is coming alongside? Who is in the circle of friends who will join us in that work? Those friends are everywhere. The circle is large, diverse and full of energy. I’m convinced the circle of Jesus’ friends is full of people who aren’t Christians, who aren’t even religious. Yet the Wild Goose is working through it all, forming and energizing that circle.
Our job is to move from passivity to citizenship, from serfdom to friendship. Our job is to join in.
Debra Rienstra is a professor of English at Calvin University in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the author of the book “Refugia Faith: Seeking Hidden Shelters, Ordinary Wonders, and the Healing of the Earth.” A member of Third Act Faith, she serves on our Coordinating Committee and will be the featured guest speaker at our next General Meeting at 8 p.m. EDT (5 p.m. PDT) on Sept. 26 . Be sure to register for the Zoom meeting.
“Going Deep” is one of two newsletters published by Third Act Faith. Our other newsletter, Third Acts of Faith, provides our members and subscribers with all the latest “News & Views” for that month. Usually coming out the third Thursday of each month, this month’s “News & Views” will be delayed a week so we can include stories about two important events taking place later this month: the NYC March to End Fossil Fuels and General Meeting.