Plastics and the Groaning Creation

 For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 
 for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it,
n hope that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 
We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 
and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit,
groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies.


It's World Environment Day, an annual event, and this year the theme is Beat Plastic Pollution.

I'm so ancient that I grew up in an age of waxed paper wrapped around my sandwiches and paper bags for my school lunches. My early toys were usually metal and they came in cardboard boxes. If I wanted a drink of water on a hot day I stuck my head under a tap (if Mom wasn't watching) or used a public fountain. Straws were made of paper and had pretty much collapsed by the end of the milkshake. Yes, I am a self-confessed geezer.

We didn't think much about the long-term residual effect of packaging because it wasn't the same issue in those days of yore. There were a lot less of us on the planet, we had much less stuff,  and we weren't concerned that most of what we owned was going to be around for another hundred years or clogging up the stomachs of birds and whales.



Now it is plastic, plastic, plastic on everything, everywhere. The oceans are awash with great rafts of it, and my blue box for plastics is always fuller than the one for paper. This has to change, and we need to be agents of change.

Why are we buying salad package in a plastic bag or box which we carry home in another plastic bag. Why do we put up with coffee cups that have lids which can't be recycled. Surely though they can invent fibre lids which are biodegradable and cups which aren't lined with plastic.  
Why isn't the law that manufacturers or retailers must take back the packaging of products they sell? And why do we buy so much for our kids and grandkids, supposedly because we love them, yet don't consider the nightmare we're creating for their lives. Actually, we already have.  

Today we can recognize that plastic is a spiritual crisis, that all creation is groaning under the weight of it all. We can also adopt the spiritual practice of considering what we purchase and how much of it. In God's name, enough already.