Polluting streams for fishing with God

[caption id="attachment_14763" align="alignleft" width="221"] Bernardo's feeding multitudes[/caption]

Editor - Want to go fishing, catch something good,  in the company of a comrade who will help you learn to fish well with simplicity and love?  It turns out it’s hard to find a good place to fish and enjoy the benefits of fishing that is not corrupted by signs saying “Keep Out” or elaborate fences and walls that make it difficult to find a stream.   These are the kinds of things that get between God and good fishing and man in faith-based groups.

As religions grow larger, the need for organization becomes the demand of those who sometimes seek order for itself alone and  want to prevent new members from straying too far from the rules.  But often it’s the organization that keeps fishing so far removed from people they starve for lack of food.

Jesus is referred to as the fisherman because his close companions were simple folk who worked at simple tasks.  He referred to the fishing for souls, in an allegorical way, to define the mission of teaching a message of love.  Other religions have their prophets, leaders, gurus,  who echo that same message of caring for your fellow man.

The currents of love and joy needed by everyone are often corrupted by “greed is good” and the manufacture of special rules to manage growth in the faith and yet maintain control.  That is the barrier between God and man exercised by virtually every faith-based organization.  But does this behavior actually serve God or just prosper those who set the rules themselves?

The Faith Life Church is expanding and building a huge church in the State of Florida. An 82,000-square-foot facility in Lakewood Ranch was purchased for $4 million in October 2010.  This is part of a pattern that has developed since the 1970’s, with the doubling of megachurches since 2008 to the current count of 1200.  The most megachurches are in Florida, Texas and Georgia.

But in that same space of time the rate of poverty has dramatically increased,  as has the gap between rich and poor and both  individual and collective violence.    This leads to fish that are dying as they can’t get the resources to live and flourish in the streams where they hoped to survive.

And while faith is said to be that vessel to carry people to everlasting good,  the barriers created by religious form and style prevent the vessel from catching or keeping many fish.  For as faith-groups gather their numbers, in edifices that grow larger every day, the people in these places have become so entrenched in political divisions that fishing  cannot happen for the poison that’s  within.

Research indicates great numbers of people may go forth to declare their faith in mega-churches, then turn away from the loving attraction that keeps folks from coming back for more because of the divisions and the power grabs from religious groups themselves.  And why that occurs seems best answered by this comment on an information site:  “Apparently followers idolize their religion more than the teachings.”

Those instruction books on fishing,  and the loving all as brothers, have no value when those crystal springs of mercy become lost in the mire of materialism, bigotry and greed.    And it is that pollution keeping us all from learning how to fish and loving fishing with the guidance of our God.

Faith and values impact the water in La., Or

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Carol Forsloff - LOUISIANA - Values and faith are involved in more than just politics and social issues but environmental ones as well, including the water folks drink.

Environmental groups, both private and public, raise concerns about contaminated water caused by hydraulic fracturing for gas or by chemical or waste companies of various types.  Politicians and some religious conservatives maintain that agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency should be dismissed because oversight may lead to rules that interfere with “good business” when some of that business impacts clean water.

East Feliciana Parishn is under a boil advisory until June 2.  The deadline has been extended as the Department of Health and Hospitals has not yet delivered its results on possible contamination following a lightning strike. But contaminated water does not result just from nature's behaviors.  Areas of contamination are often cited in public pronouncements and news in Louisiana.  Natchitoches Parish folks, for example, regularly receive notices that the water of the area has a warning label.  Another example is Plaquemine's Parish in the area of Baton Rouge.  Conamination by Dow Chemical waste has led to heavy pollution of the waters in the area.

Values impact choices.  Environmental issues are often seen as of less consequence in Louisiana with its emphasis on being an oil and gas rich state than they are in places like Oregon where reducing waste has been the order of the day for more than 30 years.  In the 1970’s people were found squashing and flattening cans with their feet in Oregon  in order to reduce tin can rubbish in the landfills.  Oregon also prides itself on its good water from lakes and streams, pointing to Bull Run water in Portland as the hallmark of the best.  Portlanders are quick to brag about the water, as having good, clean water to drink is considered a significant value in the state of going green.

On the other hand, Louisiana’s pride extends to the Saints, the food, Mardi Gras events and anything goes, and often that “anything goes” means healthy water.  Pressure on politicians to save the environment does not match that of ensuring that the productivity of oil and gas remains without interruption, even at the risk of people’s lives.

Already there are legal issues being raised by hydraulic fracturing from the Haynesville Shale, said to be poisoning cows that have been drinking water spilled from a natural gas wellpad.

Louisiana’s beauty in its foliage, fauna and flowing waters gives an atmosphere of nature at its finest; but it takes more than that to really going green.  It means valuing what faith and ethics offers most: the benefits for the overall health of the community as a foundation for a wholesome life.  So long as there is little demand placed upon politicians to ensure environmental safety, and a willingness to accept contamination as the price to pay for corporate bucks from oil and gas, boil advisories will likely continue to be part of Louisiana life when man ignores nature.

The high costs of traffic congestion in U.S

[caption id="attachment_4665" align="alignleft" width="300" caption="Traffic in Seaside, Oregon"][/caption]

"Our estimates of the total public health costs of traffic congestion in the U.S. are likely conservative," Harvard University authors write.  They point out their research considers "only the impacts in 83 urban areas and only the cost of related mortality and not the costs that could be associated with related morbidity, health care, insurance, accidents, and other factors." And there are still other costs that weigh heavily on many of us.

Those other factors include wasted time and frayed nerves, meaning lost productivity.  How many people lose several hours daily in traffic that could better be spent in doing the work needed to keep companies and culture functioning well?  Many of us, find we lose a bundle during the vehicle “creep” that continues to plague the nation’s highways.

Even flex time and the Internet have not solved the problems caused by traffic congestion.

Forbes reported in 2006,  "The worst traffic in the U.S. is getting even worse. It pollutes as the vehicles idle. It wastes the time of trucks and passenger cars. The annual delay per driver is in excess of 47 hours per year. It creates delayed shipments. It wastes more than 2.3 billion gallons of fuel each year."  Estimated cost for all that was estimated in 2003 to be more than $60 billion.

New research by the Harvard Center for Risk Analysis (HCRA) at the School of Public Health tells us the high cost of traffic congestion is a serious matter, in what constitutes the first major study on traffic’s impact on the economy, something many Americans personally experience.

Drive through or around the periphery of one of the nation’s major urban centers, and the traffic snarls are evidence of how people wait endless hours in traffic, wasted, non productive hours that are just a section of the numerous problems caused by the continuous growth in the use of the automobile in the United States.  While the cost of gas may fray consumer nerves, the wait time in traffic adds to that.  The Harvard Research Study concretized some of the costs , but the hidden costs weigh heavily on emotional burdens of work, family and personal concerns.

Traffic congestion in 2000 led to 4000 premature deaths at a  public health cost of approximately $31 billion.  Researchers estimate that if remedial methods are not taken by 2030,  there will be 1,900 premature deaths and $17 billion in social costs annually.  Last year traffic congestion caused 2,200 premature deaths in the  U.S.   The conservative estimate of related public health cost, according to researchers, was at least $18 billion.

The study, "The Public Health Costs of Traffic Congestion: A Health Risk Assessment," was published in the scientific journal "Environmental Health."  It is the first to attempt to quantify the public health implications of growing traffic congestion in America.

The greatest problems and impact on public health are in urban areas.  The Los Angeles/Long Beach/Santa Ana, California, area was first, with an estimated additional 426 premature deaths and $3.3 billion in public health costs.  It was followed by: New York City/Newark, New Jersey (+337 premature deaths, +$2.6 billion in costs);Chicago/Northern Indiana (+251 premature deaths, $2 billion costs); and San Francisco/Oakland, California (+124 premature deaths, +$1 billion in costs).

In conducting the study, the Harvard researchers projected the estimated growth of traffic congestion—and resulting emissions—from the baseline year 2000 through 2030 if no additional transportation infrastructure capacity is provided in the 83 urban areas to accommodate projected population growth.

They forecast traffic congestion will rise more than 30 percent over the period 2000 to 2030 in 18 urban areas: Raleigh, North Carolina (54 percent); Oxnard, California (47 percent); Las Vegas, Nevada (46 percent); Salt Lake City, Utah (45 percent); Sarasota/Bradenton, Florida (45 percent); San Antonio, Texas (42 percent); Orlando, Florida (41 percent); Laredo, Texas (38 percent); Richmond, Virginia(36 percent); Phoenix/Mesa, Arizona (33 percent); Pensacola, Florida (31 percent); Riverside/San Bernardino, California (31 percent); San Diego, California (31 percent); and Spokane, Washington (30 percent).

To mitigate problems caused by traffic,  researchers said solutions would  require community individualization.   In Austin community leaders have developed neighborhood plans and programs to relieve some of the traffic in what has been described as a collaborative effort the city leadership hopes will lift some of the burdens created by this Texas city's traffic.  Some other tactics suggested by Harvard researchers include better traffic management through congestion pricing, traffic light synchronization and more efficient response to traffic incidents to adding new highway and public transit capacity.  More refined models of traffic dynamics should be targeted to fit the needs of each urban area linked to the public health models developed in the study could be used to explore the impacts of proposed strategies.