Submitted by Rabbi Arthur Waskow on
Let's move our money to invest In Earth-healing renewable energy
Every year at Passover time, we recall the Ten Plagues – all ecological disasters -- that Pharaoh brought down upon the land and the people. In our own generation, we can count Ten Plagues – and more! -- that the “Climate Pharaohs” of Big Oil, Big Coal, Big Unnatural Gas are imposing upon us.
We need to stop investing our money in the Pharaohs and the Plagues that are endangering us and all our Mother Earth.
We invite you to join in a campaign to persuade religious groups to stop investing in the Climate Pharaohs -- and to reinvest instead in wind and solar energy.
Divestment/Reinvestment is both a moral and a political act. If you are committed to heal our wounded Earth, would you turn your money over to top-down pyramids of power that will use it to destroy the very Earth you love?
This question comes to an exclamation point with the festival season of Passover and Holy Week -- especially because then we remember Pharaoh and his Plagues, Caesar and his tyranny.In 2014, Palm Sunday falls on April 13. The first night of Passover is on Monday, April 14.
Just as we did in 2012 in New York and Philadelphia, and this past spring at the White House, The Shalom Center intends to focus those festival celebrations on healing the Earth that has been so wounded by our modern pharaohs. But a one-off festival moment is not the point. The festivals have power because they arise from communal commitment that spans the weeks and months, years and decades.
So we want to devote this coming year to inspiring and organizing a grass-roots campaign to persuade both small and major pools of religious money to divest from Big Corporate Carbon and reinvest in sustainable energy.What is rooted in moral commitment must take on political clout. “Praying with our pocketbooks” is powerful.
The more people and the more intensity we bring to the campaign for Moral Divestment /Reinvestment, the more pressure there will be on politicians to respond to popular demand instead of to the Lords of Carbon.
If we start now, our religious communities can make a major contribution to that public pressure, as we did fifty years ago in the struggle toward racial equality.
To help us inspire this year-long journey, we need your help.
Divestment/Reinvestment is both a moral and a political act. If you are committed to heal our wounded Earth, would you turn your money over to top-down pyramids of power that will use it to destroy the very Earth you love?
This question comes to an exclamation point with the festival season of Passover and Holy Week -- especially because then we remember Pharaoh and his Plagues, Caesar and his tyranny.In 2014, Palm Sunday falls on April 13. The first night of Passover is on Monday, April 14.
Just as we did in 2012 in New York and Philadelphia, and this past spring at the White House, The Shalom Center intends to focus those festival celebrations on healing the Earth that has been so wounded by our modern pharaohs. But a one-off festival moment is not the point. The festivals have power because they arise from communal commitment that spans the weeks and months, years and decades.
So we want to devote this coming year to inspiring and organizing a grass-roots campaign to persuade both small and major pools of religious money to divest from Big Corporate Carbon and reinvest in sustainable energy.What is rooted in moral commitment must take on political clout. “Praying with our pocketbooks” is powerful.
The more people and the more intensity we bring to the campaign for Moral Divestment /Reinvestment, the more pressure there will be on politicians to respond to popular demand instead of to the Lords of Carbon.
If we start now, our religious communities can make a major contribution to that public pressure, as we did fifty years ago in the struggle toward racial equality.
To help us inspire this year-long journey, we need your help.
We propose that by the time of Passover/ Holy Week one year from now, multireligious groups all across the country come together to call for Moral Divestment/ Reinvestment from the Climate Pharaohs and the Plagues they have been bringing upon us.
To make this campaign work takes work –- at the grass roots. In our next mailing, we will suggest ways you can take an active part in your own community to get this campaign going.
To make this campaign work also takes money. As the ancient rabbis taught, “Eyn kemakh, eyn Torah. No bread, no Torah.” So please send us a donation specifically for use in getting this campaign going.
§ For example: we want to bring seminary students from different communities into this effort on a two-fifths-time basis. They will need to be paid.
§ And we want a broader group of young people to pursue the divest/ reinvest campaign by using the celebrations and practices of their own traditions. That requires a week-long training session – and that will cost money.
To sow the tiny seeds that sprout to make big changes, we use the money you donate with great care. And we can do that only if you donate!
So we ask you to make a (tax-deductible) donation. Please pause right now to donate by clicking to
https://theshalomcenter.org/civicrm/contribute/transact?reset=1&id=6
§ And we want a broader group of young people to pursue the divest/ reinvest campaign by using the celebrations and practices of their own traditions. That requires a week-long training session – and that will cost money.
To sow the tiny seeds that sprout to make big changes, we use the money you donate with great care. And we can do that only if you donate!
So we ask you to make a (tax-deductible) donation. Please pause right now to donate by clicking to
https://theshalomcenter.org/civicrm/contribute/transact?reset=1&id=6
If you donate $360 or more, a gift of healing for the planet our grandchildren will live in, I will thank you with a personally inscribed set of five books of mine on a spiritual approach to healing the Earth-Human relationship: the new and revised edition of Seasons of Our Joy; Down-to-Earth Judaism-- Food, Money, Sex, and the Rest of Life; Godwrestling -- Round 2; and the two-volume collection of Jewish eco-wisdom through 4,000 years of Torah of the Earth.
Smaller donations of $180, $72, or $36 will also bring you a thank-you gift from us.
Smaller donations of $180, $72, or $36 will also bring you a thank-you gift from us.
Let us join with each other to heal our wounded Mother Earth!
