Stewardship

Stewardship means the management of all things in our lives.

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Stewardship does not mean
    what we usually think it means.

It has to do with management,
   but it is not just the management of money
       or financial resources.

Stewardship involves everything.

Money is included,
    but the principles of stewardship
        guide us in more than what we give.

Those principles are also closely related
    to the way we earn and spend our money
        and our whole attitude toward property
            and relationships.

Spending on products that are sustainable
    is an important part of stewardship in our time.

Stewardship even has a role to play in evolution.

Charles Darwin wrote,
   "In the long history of humankind
        (and animal kind, too)
             those who learned
                to collaborate and improvise
                   most effectively
                       have prevailed. "

In the process of development and growth
    collaboration and improvisation
        are both forms of stewardship.

For me, the most important resource
    in learning to understand the meaning
        of stewardship
             is a parable of Jesus.

His parables were teaching tools,
    examples from ordinary, everyday life.

The stories made a single point,
    illustrating one important concept.

In the case of the parable I'm about to read,
   that one concept is stewardship.

Luke 16:1-13 New International Version (NIV)
Scripture quotations marked (NIV) are taken from the Holy Bible, New International Version®, NIV®.
    Copyright © 1973, 1978, 1984 by Biblica, Inc.™ 
    Used by permission of Zondervan. All rights reserved worldwide.
    www.zondervan.com
The Parable of the Shrewd Manager
16 Jesus told his disciples: “There was a rich man whose manager was accused of wasting his possessions. 2 So he called him in and asked him, ‘What is this I hear about you? Give an account of your management, because you cannot be manager any longer.’

3 “The manager said to himself, ‘What shall I do now? My master is taking away my job. I’m not strong enough to dig, and I’m ashamed to beg— 4 I know what I’ll do so that, when I lose my job here, people will welcome me into their houses.’

5 “So he called in each one of his master’s debtors. He asked the first, ‘How much do you owe my master?’

6 “‘Nine hundred gallons of olive oil,’ he replied.

“The manager told him, ‘Take your bill, sit down quickly, and make it four hundred and fifty.’

7 “Then he asked the second, ‘And how much do you owe?’

“‘A thousand bushels of wheat,’ he replied.

“He told him, ‘Take your bill and make it eight hundred.’

8 “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light. 9 I tell you, use worldly wealth to gain friends for yourselves, so that when it is gone, you will be welcomed into eternal dwellings.

10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much. 11 So if you have not been trustworthy in handling worldly wealth, who will trust you with true riches? 12 And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else’s property, who will give you property of your own?

13 “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve both God and money.”


This parable is often regarded
   as too difficult to understand.

Why would Jesus make an example
     of mismanagement?

But mismanagement is not the point of the parable.

Management is the point of the parable,
       and for our purposes today,
              management means stewardship.

What the manager did in the parable
     involved the use of property of his employer
           for his own benefit, yes,
                 but doing it in a way
                     that benefits many others.

So this gives me the basic concept of stewardship
    that I find most meaningful:
        It is the management of any kind of resource
            in our hands
                for the benefit of others.

This is how I see collaboration and improvisation
     as described by Darwin
         in the successful processes of evolution.

It may or may not be altruistic or idealistic,
      but the benefits for everyone will be similar.

The steward in the parable
    was skilled at improvising a solution
         to his situation.

He did so in collaboration
     with his employer's debtors.

He benefitted, and so did they.

He is often called the dishonest steward as a result,
    but he had the legal right to do what he did.

Even his employer commended his shrewdness
    before he was sent away.

Jesus did not commend his shrewdness,
    but spoke clearly of making friends for ourselves
       by means of the worldly wealth
          in our hands.

The money and property in our hands
    is that worldly wealth,
          and it's there to be used
                not only for ourselves alone
                     but for as many others as possible.

The question arose in our response time last month
     whether stewardship and capitalism can coexist.

Capitalism has as its goal
    the accumulation of money and property.

Stewardship seeks to distribute money and property
     in ways that will benefit everyone the most.

So stewardship and capitalism are not opposites,
     but they are necessary
         to keep each other in balance.

If capitalism is to survive,
     stewardship can enable it to provide resources
          for many more people.

Laissez faire capitalism,
    that is, capitalism without restraint,
        tends to concentrate resources
            in very few hands,

so it cannot coexist with stewardship.

We hear a lot of discussion about socialism lately.

In reality,
   socialism simply refers to ownership
        of the means of production and distribution.

In a socialist society, production and distribution
    are in the hands of the collective,
        of the state, the local government,
             or the workers of a farm or factory.

As such it can be a vehicle of stewardship,
    providing for benefits to the greatest number.

The problem is that socialism does not include
     a cure for greed.

Wealth is managed by very few people 
     as a socialist society carries out the tasks
          of production and distribution.

Corruption all too often becomes all too easy.

Prevention and punishment of corruption
    require the expenditure of too many resources.

A mixed economy,
    where capitalism is managed
         under principles of stewardship
              seems to work much better.

Other principles can be used to manage capitalism.

It can enhance the power of the state.

It can concentrate wealth
     in the hands of a few people.
          (Does that sound all too familiar?)

The principles of stewardship work best
     because they refer to management
           for the sake of providing resources to others,
                to as many people as possible.

Mutual aid toward survival is good principle
     not only for species
           as in natural selection and evolution,
                but also in the development of societies.

Where resources are limited,
    the principles of stewardship
        are even more important.

A mixed economy enables a population to survive
      and even thrive in times and places of scarcity.

Land is scarce in the Hawaiian islands,
    and a concept of Kuleana rights
        allows tenant farmers
            to access  landlocked parcels.

There have been attempts to diminish those rights,
     but they stand to this day,
         enabling a kind of stewardship of land
              that serves their society well.

 In many ways stewardship enables species
     and communities to thrive
          when they could not do so
                without good management.

A way to sum it up is something I've said before
    and I'm sure I'll say it again:

We can provide for everyone's need.

We cannot provide for anyone's greed.

Amen.

So let it be.

Blessed be.

     Dominion versus Dominionism

An age old misunderstanding of the Song of Creation has resulted in terrible pain for Gaia and Her creatures. Dominion is not domination. Rather, dominion is loving care.

One of my hobby horses is,
   "Beware the -isms!"

Many of you are familiar with my hobby horses,
    I'm sure.

They're ideas that I think are important for our time,
    and I tend to ride them a lot.

I try not to ride them to death.

I'm so opposed to the "-isms" 
   that they may be in more danger
      of being ridden to death
         than some of my other hobby horses.

What I'm talking about
      is that (in most cases)
            the "-ity" is good.

The "-ism"  is not so good.

Am I still not making much sense?

How about a couple of examples.

Community is generally a good thing.

Communism is sometimes not thought to be
                            so good.

My favorite way to approach this matter
    actually fits today's topic exceptionally well.

In Spanish there are two words for Christianity.
   [(Notice that the word is an -ity only in English.)]

One word is cristiandad, Christianity.

The other is cristianismo, Christianism.

Cristiandad is Christian living.

Cristianismo is Christian doctrine and institutions.

Christian living, in the sense of following Jesus,
    is generally regarded as a good thing.

Christianism,
   in the sense of dogma and its enforcement,
      is sometimes regarded as not so good.

In our time,
    one of the expressions of Christianism
         is known as dominionism.

As with many names for movements or ideologies,
    this name was applied by its enemies.

(The same thing happened with the name
     Christians as applied to the early Christian church.
         In the vernacular of the time, the word,
              Christian, would have implied,
                  the smeared or oiled ones.
                      Eventually,
                          they wore the insulting nickname
                                    as a badge of honor.)

The dominionists of our time
     are those who subscribe to
          a particular interpretation of Genesis 1:26-28:

(KJV)

"26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. 28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth."

Now these words of Genesis are newly important
    to all the world
        because a fundamentalistic interpretation
              is claiming that dominion means
                   permission to exploit.

In a nutshell, the idea that dominion is exploitation
       is a simple summary of dominionism.

[(With that in mind,
     let me point out that the term dominion
            here in the first chapter
                 of the first book of the Bible
                     does not necessarily mean
                        what the dominionists think it means.)]

Dominion does clearly mean rule.

It is from the the Latin word, dominus, lord.

It does not mean "lording it over" anyone
                      or anything.

The word dominion means loving care,
            not exploitation.

It means stewardship,
      in the sense of the greatest good for all involved.

I don't want to pursue the subject of stewardship
    too much right now,
       because it's another concept
           that's widely misunderstood
                and misrepresented.

It's a topic worthy of consideration on its own.

At the same time,
   the idea of the greatest good
        for the greatest number
            is a helpful one for our purposes.

The person to whom that quote is attibuted
   is Jeremy Bentham,
      who is also known
         as an early advocate of animal rights.

And that brings us back to our theme of
    dominion vs. dominionism.

Inasmuch as dominionism refers
     to lording it over creation
          and dominion means stewardship,
               the issue of animal rights
                    is a good bellwether
                         of the care of Mother Earth
                              vs. the exploitation of her.

Because we human children of Mother Earth eat,
    dominion is an important concept for us.

We cannot produce our own food in our bodies
    the way plants can do it,
        so we have to eat other creatures
             in order to sustain our lives.

The way we approach eating plants and animals
     is a way to begin to understand
          our relationship to the Earth,
                to Gaia herself.

Vegans and vegetarians provide an example to us all
     that humans can be nourished well
          without eating meat.

There are, of course, controversies on the subject
    as there are about almost everything.

Some food experts believe that feeding the world
     with our present resources and technology
          would require the consumption of some meat,
                in moderation, of course.

In any case, a right understanding of dominion
    can include enough food for us all,
        and even food animals can be included
             in the concept of loving care.

I've spoken of Temple Grandin before,
       and I'm sure I will do so again:

She is a professor of animal science
     at Colorado State University,
         and an excellent example of dominion,
              rightly understood.

She is not opposed
   to the slaughter of animals for food,
       but she has developed
          a remarkably humane method
             to remove cruelty from the whole procedure.

Even from the point of view of meat production, 
     her methods are helpful, economically viable,
        and they are widely used in the industry.

Of course, there is controversy
     among animal rights activists
           about the very concept
                of speaking about
                   compassion and respect for animals
                        in the context of slaughtering them
                             for our food.

Yes, as long as meat is part of our diet,
     it is an important part of dominion
          to treat with compassion the animals
              who provide the meat.

Temple Grandin actually spoke
    here in Coeur D'Alene last November, 
       and I should probably 
          apologize for telling you about it
              after the fact.

In my own defense, I just learned about it
    while preparing for today's sermon.

In any case, compassion is the heart of the matter.

Compassion for Gaia, for our whole planet,
    is probably the most vital part of dominion.

The idea of unlimited exploitation
    has not been serving us well by any means.

True dominion would call for more concern
  than we have traditionally shown
     for the sustainability
        of all of our activities anywhere in the world.

Since charity begins at home,
   the way we treat each other
       is the first step toward dominion:
          again, not trying to lord it over each other,
              but showing each other loving care.

Food and energy production would also be impacted
     by a right understanding of dominion.

Not far to the south of us
   is one of the richest agricultural regions
       on the planet.

The Paradise called the Palouse
     has deep topsoil, blown in for millenia
          from volcanic activity to our west.

If it's treated well,
    the topsoil can endure for many generations,
        even conceivably improving over time.

If it's allowed to erode away by poor practices,
    most of it could be gone
        in a couple of generations.

Likewise to our south,
    near the town of Rosalia, Washington,
         there is an impressive wind farm.

To me it symbolizes dominion in a good way.

As we notice especially during the present season,
     wind is definitely a sustainable resource
          in our part of the world.

Renewable and sustainable sources of energy
   may be the single most important expression
       of true dominion in our loving care of our world.

Last week I heard Bill Nye the Science Guy
   say that a sustained, world-wide effort
      could lead to 80 percent of the energy we use
         being sustainable in 20 years.

Continued effort could take us to 100 percent
     sustainable energy in 40 years.

Our task in the meantime
   will be persuasion.

In the first place, we can speak of the understanding
  of dominion as loving care rather than exploitation.

We can also advocate for a better understanding
 of climate change and the things we can do about it.

The horrible cold weather
    in the midwestern states last week
       is a direct result of climate change,
          not evidence that it isn't happening.

As more and more people begin to experience
    the worsening consequences of climate change,
         our compassionate voices will be needed
             to help them understand what is happening
                 and to offer hope of change and healing.

It's still not too late
    if we accept the better understanding of dominion
        as loving care.

I believe that people
    who have denied climate change in the past
         will soon be looking for answers
             as we all must try
                  to live with the consequences.

Acting with compassion
     as true dominion calls us to do
          could truly save the world in our time.

Amen.
So mote it be.
Blessed be.