Creative responses

The audience was anxious, worried, and it showed when their turn came to put questions to the panel members: instead of questions there were rants. What subject was getting them so rattled? ‘The Future of Climate Change’ was the title of a meeting at St. John’s Church, Waterloo on Wednesday addressed by an impressive panel including Phil Bloomer (OXFAM), Paula Clifford (Christian Aid), Claire Foster (Ethics Foundation) and Mark Dowd (Operation Noah and a journalist).

Faced with an almost daily news diet of overwhelmingly urgent, global problems making us feel anxious, guilty, angry, the temptation to give up and find the nearest bucket of sand can be strong. Perhaps Mark Dowd was most attuned to the audience’s level of guilt and anxiety. Practical actions - giving money for example - are, he suggested, prayers - sacraments even. “How much shall I give to the Pakistan Flood relief effort? Oh dear! I’m sending a cheque for the paltry sum of £50! What good is that?” But whatever the amount, it is still a sacrament of care.

It is counter-intuitive to relax when faced with an emergency but think about finding yourself trapped in a bog or quicksands: start flailing about and you increase your risk of death. Relax – that is, first forget about survival and accept the situation you are in – and you vastly increase the possibility of coming up with a creative solution to get you out of it.

Solutions for some people might include a dedicated life of heroic action in a great cause. Not so for most of us. Faced with global problems and headline-grabbing disasters, the appropriate response feels woefully inadequate. But each response, no matter how apparently trivial is a sacrament. Rants about the state of the world get us nowhere. Cynthia Bourgeault in her book The Wisdom Jesus writes:

“.... surrender [to what is the case here and now] is an act of spiritual intelligence resulting in a markedly increased capacity for creative response.”