Brian made a list of some things to think about as we try to understand our part in the prosperity crises (of the planet) and what we can do about it. read through these ideas and find something you can do to change those around you. Turn it into an initiative and share it with others.

Prosperity Crisis: We find ourselves in a prosperity system that is currently incapable of living within environmental limits. It withdraws more resources and injects more wastes than the planet can provide or absorb. We need to find practices that help us create wise, sane, and sustainable prosperity, not suicidal prosperity.

1. Buy ethically: Learn the story of something you buy regularly – shirts, tomatoes, cherries, cheese, shoes, books, coffee, beef, coal, oil, furniture, whatever. Be a detective and ask questions like these: Where was the item produced? How? By whom? What were the effects on the local environment and economy? How was it transported to the store where you purchased it? What will happen to it after you are finished with it? How much of it can be recycled? Learn about fair trade,” and simultaneously avoid unethical products and businesses and support ethical
ones. Check out tradeasone.org and other ethical buying sites.

2. Eat ethically: Read Jane Goodall’s Harvest of Hope, or try “a year of eating locally” (or maybe a month), inspired by Bill McKibbin’s Deep Economy.

3. Work ethically. Learn about sustainability and the triple bottom line, and organize a meeting with your management or owners to consider transforming your company into a sustainable one. (Check out solsustainability.org)

4. Invest ethically. Invest in companies practicing sustainability and the triple bottom line, and se your stockholder influence to move companies in that direction.

5. Encourage social entrepreneurs. Learn about microenterprise and support organizations that promote economic development among the poor.

6. Learn your environmental address. Your political address is a country and state. Your postal ddress is a street and zip code. Your environmental address is a watershed. After you discover our environmental address, learn about the health of your watershed and find ways to protect and heal it. Learn about your state’s endangered plant and animal species, and consult your state’s department of natural resources to learn about other environmental issues. (Begin with
water.usgs.gov/wsc/findwatershed.html.)

7. Support Creative Artists. Withdraw support from destructive musicians, film-makers,
architects, visual artists, and other artists whose message and work contributes to the suicide machine’s harmful framing stories and promotes its covert curriculum. In their place, support artists who expose and counter the suicide machine’s covert curriculum. Especially encourage local and indigenous artists rather than limiting yourself to the “big stars” of the dominant entertainment industry.

8. Reduce your environmental footprint. Learn about your environmental footprint through zerofootprint.net and myfootprint.org, and reduce it. After you’ve begun this process in your own life, invite your company and church to do the same.

9. Consider a new career or calling. If you’re in high school or college, pursue a career that works for the common good rather than simply pursuing personal profit. If your line of work contributes to the suicide machine, find alternate employment, or find ways to change your workplace to be in greater alignment with the way of Jesus. If you are retired, consider a second career (paid or volunteer) that dismantles the suicide machine and contributes to a transformed world.

10. Speak Up: Voice appropriate approval and disapproval in conversations, in letters to the editor, on call-in shows, and on websites. Don’t insult or condemn: simply voice your beliefs, hopes, concerns, and understandings – and then listen respectfully and respond appropriately to the replies of others. Withdraw your consent from people and organizations who promote the suicide machine.

11. Ask Questions: Ask politicians what kind of leadership they are going to offer on the prosperity/planetary crisis. Check out http://blog.beliefnet.com/godspolitics/2007/09/theleadership-
gap-on-global-w.html and stepitup07.org, for ideas on how to do so.

12. Encourage Those Who Speak Up: Encourage and support journalists, writers, radio
personalities, artists, preachers, and others who speak up. One such group is “Red Letter Christians” – hosted by sojo.net.

13. Determine a personal maximum income, or implement a graduated tithe: If unlimited prosperity is indeed a problem, you can choose a personal maximum income (say, three or five or ten times the national average income), above which you will give income away to good causes on a monthly or annual basis. Or commit yourself to a “graduated tithe,” where you give 10% of your income up to your local or national average income; then increase your giving by 5% (or some pre-determined amount) for every 25% increase in income. See for example
urbana.org/pdf/feat_money_graduatedtithe.pdf.

14. Vacation Ethically: Explore and practice ecotourism (tourism that is sensitive to the
environment) and social tourism (where you learn about other societies and cultures through travel, and seek to serve during and after your travel experience). Many so-called mission trips are actually forms of social tourism.

15. Practice Neighborliness: Read the story of Ruth in the Bible, and seek to be like Boaz by “adopting” one poor person or family into your own family. For example, help a poor teenager go to college, or visit a sick person in the hospital. Organizations like World Vision, World Relief, Compassion International, various mission agencies, and local churches can help you.

16. Vote for The Common Good: Don’t simply vote for your personal self-interest; vote for the good of the poor, minorities, and your enemies too. Also, remember that birds, streams, frogs, elephants, and the wind can’t vote: use your vote in their behalf. Study one animal or plant that is endangered in your area – or elsewhere – and become its advocate in some practical ways.

17. Connect with Creation. Plant a garden. Put up a birdfeeder and birdhouse. Improve your property as a habitat for local species of animals and plants, especially those under threat by human interference. Support groups that care for creation.

18. Pick a species. Choose a species of plant or animal that is endangered, and become its champion.