Miscellaneous

[Note: As I will be on vacation enjoying God’s creation this week, we will be looking back at some of the more popular posts from this year.]

This article was originally posted at
http://www.creationhope.com/2010/02/10/green-adventures-diaper-changes-part-1/

Be sure to read part 2 and part 3 as well.

Green Adventures: a series in which we invite you into the adventures from our journey.

Many of the changes that we make to care for God’s creation are really quite easy.  Often it only means purchasing one product instead of another.  For example, buying LED or compact fluorescent light bulbs instead of incandescents.  Other times it is just a subtle change in habit like remembering to switch off lights and unplug electronics that are not being used.  However, there are other times where it is much more difficult and it really challenges us to go green.  The reality is that caring for creation often comes at a cost.  And our latest adventure is one that I think will definitely come at a cost.

My wife and I have wanted to change to more eco-friendly diapers for a long time.  In fact, we were really looking into it a year or so ago but couldn’t pull the trigger.  Since almost everyone we know uses one of the same two brands of disposable diapers there was a sense of fear about what lay beyond the known world.  It was like we were embarking into some dark chasm of the unknown world of alternative diapers.  Somehow it slipped our minds and before we knew it another year had passed.

Now, for those of you who don’t know, disposable diapers are really awful for the environment.  The short of it is that it takes them ages to break down, they preserve bacteria and whatnot which can get into water that may not be treated properly, and they take up a ton of space in our landfills.  Most of the time there is just no beating things that we reuse versus things that we throw away in terms of carbon footprint and environmental cost.  This seems to be one of those times.  Did I mention how stinking expensive disposable diapers are?  Even when you buy them from discount stores in the largest packages possible (which at least reduces packaging) they are not cheap (about 20-25 cents each).  Not to mention that babies use a lot of them each day.  My daughter, who is almost 2, uses about 5 a day, but it was easily twice that when she was really little.  Well, that really adds up my friends.

So, recently the whole area of diapers came up again as we targeted new areas of our life to change in order to better care for God’s creation.  We looked into the more eco-friendly disposable diapers.  We discovered however that even the “eco diapers” came at a steep cost.  There were certainly improvements over regular diapers, don’t get me wrong, but to be honest they just seemed like minor incremental changes.  It’s nice that they are chlorine-free and are made from better materials.  Unfortunately, however, they just did not seem to do the trick and ultimately still wind up making our landfills a little taller and smellier.

We kept looking.  Of course, there aren’t too many more places to look.  There are really only 2 other options; well, 3 if you are okay with your toddlers walking around naked, conducting their business wherever they please.  The first (and better if you can pull it off) is to potty train your child early.  In our case, our daughter is not yet ready for that step.  If your child is, more power to you.  Using the toilet would certainly be the best option.  The second is to move to cloth diapers.  At this point we were past the point of no return.  We had decided to move forward but did not know it would cost us so much.  We were slipping head first into a big pile of… well, at least they are made of cotton.  So, we made it official.  We were moving into the world of cloth, non-disposable diapers.  A world that is much more complicated.  A world that takes a lot more work.  A world in which my likelihood of getting human excrement on myself is much higher.  But a world which is much cheaper (we expect to recover the initial cost outlay in about 3/4 of a year) and which, more importantly, will help us to better care for God’s creation.  And so our latest adventure began.

[Continue reading past the break to follow the rest of this phase of our adventure.]

While we were resolute in our decision – I must be honest – I was nervous about what we were doing.  All we have ever used are disposable diapers.  You put them on, baby fills them up, you throw them out.  It doesn’t get an simpler or more familiar than that.  But now, we are journeying into something totally foreign and seemingly much more complicated.  I didn’t even know what to buy, where to buy it, or how to use it.  Fortunately my wife (what would I do without her) remembered a blog post she had read a while back that really helped us through the process.  The Lazy Mom’s Guide to Cloth Diapering walked us through some of the main options and weighed the pros and cons for us.  This certainly opened the way for us to walk down a trail that we soon realized had already been blazed by many pioneers.

After much research and mulling over the options, we decided that bumGenius diapers were the best option for us (at least we hope they are).  So we proceeded to Amazon to buy them.  We tracked down the product, found a 20 pack (which seemed right for us), and went to add it to our cart when out of nowhere we hit a huge wall.  It was not the price that we were hung up on.  Nor was it the brand.  Nor was it the amount of diapers.  Rather it was the colors that came in the packages.  I had just assumed that we would get the boy package while my wife wanted the girl package.  You see, we do our best not to get sucked into the whole idea that you should buy a girl version of the toy car, stroller, toy, etc and then when you have a boy later buy the same exact thing in a more masculine shade.  We feel that this is mostly a marketing ploy to get more money from us, which results in greater and totally unnecessary consumption.  So we often try to go neutral so that things will work for the next kid(s).  So I was trying to work out of this principle and thought that the boy colors were more neutral.  Meanwhile, my wife noticed that the boy colors are quite bold and would look lame if our daughter wore a skirt or dress.  Besides, she thought, our (potential) boy would never wear a skirt thus hiding the occasional pink diaper.  But, I pointed out that babies go around only wearing a diaper often enough that he might be caught in pink (in fact 8 of the 20 were a shade of pink).  But what’s wrong with him wearing pink she said…  You get where this conversation went, don’t you?

After a short break, my wife saved our marriage and pointed out that if we bought from Cotton Babies instead we could buy a 12 pack and a 6 pack in which we could choose each individual color.  In the end we wound up with 18 bumGenius diapers, of which only 1 was pink.  Problem solved.

As we look forward to this adventure, I find that I am filled with a variety of hopes and fears.  Here are my thoughts, rational or not:

Hopes

1. I am terribly excited about the amazing difference we can make in God’s creation.  You see, for us this is about more than the coming months we have until my daughter is potty-trained but is about the next kid or two that we hope to have.  This has the potential to make a small but significant dent in a landfill and mean many fewer resources and chemicals used and discarded.  Ultimately, I hope God is pleased by this decision.

2. I hope that it will be a quick transition.  My desire is to quickly get into the new habits that this will require of us.  I am banking on that it will be like composting where it is just a part of my routine now rather than a burden that I regret each time I change a diaper.

3. I hope that this will help curb other disposable tendencies that I have.  Think of all the things we dispose of easily:  plastic bags, food, relationships.  I am hoping that this new habit will rub off in other areas.

4. I hope that others will be inspired by our efforts.  This may not even be that they themselves make the diaper switch, but I hope that we can give others courage to venture out into the unknown challenges of going green in their own lives and circumstances.

Fears

1. Let me be totally upfront with you.  My biggest fear is that we will fail, that we will not find a way to make this part of our lives, that we will have wasted the money to buy these (though the resources would not be wasted as we would surely give them to someone else) and resort back to disposable diapers.  I don’t even see this as an option at this point as I despise defeat.  However, my fear is that we will one day give up on this.  Please encourage us along the way.

2. I am afraid of what to do with diapers when in public places.  Obviously, wet diapers are easy.  And surely there are bags that you can put the dirty ones into.  I am more worried about those monstrous explosions that come every now and then.  What to do with a diaper that absolutely wreaks like death and you can’t throw it away.

3. I am also worried that they won’t contain my daughter’s uhh… byproducts in the same way.  Again, it’s not the wet diapers I am worried about so much as the massive diarrheal volcanoes that erupt without warning.  I hope these things do their job well (of course I have seen the best of the best in disposables fail plenty of times).

4. Finally, my inner germophobe comes out and worries about the more complex, vulnerable process.  Part of me really likes the ease of throwing away the bacteria, etc. never to be haunted by it again.  Now I will have to deal with the precarious task of carrying the goods to the toilet and trying my best to empty them with precision into the bowl without missing or, even worse, getting them on myself somehow.

I imagine my wife’s hopes and fears differ somewhat as she is not nearly as afraid of fecal matter as I am.  Perhaps she will chime in on the comments.

Here are a few additional resources for you if you decide to embark on this adventure yourself:

www.clothdiaper.com

www.cottonbabies.com

http://www.diaperjunction.com/

Our diapers just arrived today.  The real adventure begins tomorrow.  You can walk this journey with us over the coming weeks as I will continue to blog about how this all plays out.  Stay tuned and please wish us luck.

[Note: As I will be on vacation enjoying God’s creation this week, we will be looking back at some of the more popular posts from this year.]

This article was originally posted at
http://www.creationhope.com/2010/01/28/beauty-of-creation-grand-canyon-snow/

Beauty of Creation: a series where we look to take a moment and appreciate the amazing glory of God’s creation.

Grand Canyon Snow

Photo by Heather Orduña

Thank you to reader Heather Orduña who sent in her picture of the Grand Canyon covered in winter snow.  It is fascinating to see how it changes when covered in snow.  Though I have been fortunate enough to see and walk down into the canyon, I have yet to see it in the winter.  The intricate details of the canyon are a testament to God’s glory.  How beautiful is His creation!

Have you taken a picture that contains a glimpse of God’s glorious creation?  Consider sharing it with our Creation Hope readers.  Send it to us and we will post it so that others may appreciate another aspect of the splendor that God has placed all around us.

[Note: As I will be on vacation enjoying God’s creation this week, we will be looking back at some of the more popular posts from this year.]

This article was originally posted at
http://www.creationhope.com/2010/02/19/eco-theology-to-serve-and-protect/

Eco Theology: a series which explores the theology of creation care in bite-size chunks

If there’s one thing you learn when you study other languages in depth, it’s that translations do not fully capture what was originally said.  Translation is not mathematics.  There is not a 1 to 1 relationship between the meanings of most words.  For example, if my bilingual daughter uses the word “guardar” I might translate it as “keep” when I tell my wife.  But that might leave out much of the original meaning of the word which can also be "guard, watch over, put away, save, observe, bear, protect."  You see, when separated from the original language, the event, and the cultural and linguistic context, we face many challenges in understanding what was meant.  This is why computers, as smart as they are, still have so much trouble translating from one language to another.  Likewise, that is why we often have such trouble understanding what the Bible says or why we misunderstand certain things when relying only on the translation of it.

This is the case with some key creation care scriptures.  When read out of context or without an informed understanding of the original text, we can miss the meaning.  So, today we will look at one of those passages in depth to better understand its meaning and our theology.

The LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to till it and keep it.

Genesis 2:15

It is unfortunate that this verse has often been translated inadequately and that the deeper meaning does not come through in the English translations. As such, this verse is often skipped over as the language merely appears to apply to gardening.  If I understand it only as tilling the earth (in an agricultural sense), I can think that Adam was a farmer and I am not.   So I might think that this verse does not apply to me.  However, a look at the original language reveals there is a much deeper meaning behind this scripture. The Hebrew word here translated as “till” is abad. The basic meaning of this word is “to serve,” which implies a very different relationship.

Also, the word translated as “keep” is shamar. While this is not a bad translation is does not capture the fuller sense of the word which includes the ideas of: guarding, watching over, protecting, taking care of, preserving, and devoting oneself to.  This implies a much more caring relationship. Calvin DeWitt says, “God calls us to give the garden of creation our caring service.”  God has placed man and creation in a symbiotic relationship.  Man is not simply told to use creation for his own benefit, but is to devote himself to the care and preservation of creation.

Furthermore, this helps me to better understand Genesis 1:28 in which God tells mankind that they should subdue the earth and have dominion over living things.  We often think of this dominion as dominating.  But what we see here is more of a servant leadership.  Additionally, in Genesis 1 we see God using “sovereign power in a way that shares life and life-giving power, and human beings are in a position to master creatures in an appropriate way because they share these characteristics” (From John Goldingay’s Old Testament Theology).  If our great God, the Creator, uses His power in this way and we are made in His image, how do you suppose we ought to use our power?  Mankind’s use of authority should not inhibit and damage creation but free and develop it so that it may flourish.

In my personal journey, understanding this difference is where things really began to change.  No longer did I have this mentality that I should dominate the earth for my own selfish purposes.  Rather, I realized that we have been called into a caring, protecting, symbiotic relationship with God’s creation.  What a difference!

[Note: As I will be on vacation enjoying God’s creation this week, we will be looking back at some of the more popular posts from this year.]

This article was originally posted at
http://www.creationhope.com/2010/04/14/green-adventures-green-business-cards/

Green Adventures: a series in which we invite you into the adventures from our journey.

When we started Creation Hope I knew it wasn’t going to be easy.  When your mission calling others to live lives the care for God’s creation, business as usual is often not an option for you.  Whereas another business or ministry has standard ways of doing things and resources, we have to go out of our way to do things in more creation-friendly ways.

When most organizations need dry erase markers, they simply go to their business supply resource and pick them up.  In contrast, we felt the need to find eco-friendly markers which meant doing a lot of research to track down a better option.

When most organizations need to purify the office air, they buy an air purifier and plug those electric smelly thingies into the outlet.  In contrast, we felt the need to find natural cleansers which ultimately meant tracking down indoor plants that clean toxins from the air in our office.

When most organizations need business cards, they buy them from their normal local or online printer with relative ease and quickness.  In contrast, when we needed business cards we embarked on a huge adventure.

Months ago I began looking into the most creation-friendly way to create our business cards.  What you would think would be a simple, straight-forward task, has resulted in countless hours of research.  I figured that I would simply need to track down what others before me had down and follow in their footsteps.  Unfortunately that was not the case as there weren’t many footsteps to follow.  As it turns out, there are very few options for truly green business cards.

Sure quite a few printers claim to have green business cards, but a more in-depth look reveals that it is mostly greenwashing (making things look greener than they really are).  For example, some printers call their products green when the only eco-friendly thing about it is that it contains 10% recycled materials in the paper.  Others use paper with higher recycled content but still use chemicals to brighten the paper.  Most use ink that is petroleum based and emits VOCs (volatile organic compounds – basically things you don’t want to be breathing in and are bad for the planet).

There are a few exceptions however.  I finally tracked down the companies that I thought offered the best available options.  In fact, I really liked what Greenerprinter had to offer.  They offer 100% recycled paper processed without chlorine, use soy and vegetable inks with no or low VOC’s that are processed chemical free, minimize their waste,  AND they even offset their carbon emissions (a purchased offset results in the reduction of carbon emissions elsewhere; i.e. planting trees).  I have been thoroughly impressed by this company.  I fully expect to purchase some future printing project from them.

Regarding our business cards, several times I priced them out, uploaded my own design, and nearly purchased them.  However, I did not go ahead for a few reasons:

1. Our organization has extremely limited resources.  While the cost was not excessive (as little as $30 for 250 cards, though more expensive as you customize certain items; I think my order was priced out at like $60 for 500), every little bit counts for us.  While not much more than regular business cards, there is definitely a premium that you pay.
2. While great, recycled is not the first option.  Many of you will be familiar with the adage “Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.”  There is a hierarchy here.  First we reduce our consumption, then we reuse things vigorously, finally we recycle items.  [Note: putting things is the trash should be a last ditch effort.]  So, I just felt a little bad participating in this same system when there might be other alternatives.
3. I can be a little bit insane at times (my wife certainly agrees).  I have a tendency to be a perfectionist and take things to the extreme on occasion.  Purchasing them from Greenerprinter was an excellent option, the best I had found yet something in me pushed me to take it a step further.

This decision not to move forward with a professional printer left us in uncharted waters.  It was back to the drawing board.  More research.  More scouring the internet for any ideas.  More brainstorming and thinking outside of the box.  If recycled wasn’t the route we wanted to take, where did that leave us?

I was left holding the following competing goals in tension:

1. It had to be done in a way that was respectful of God’s creation.
2. It had to be reasonably priced.  Given our limited resources here, high priced options are not available to us.
3. It had to be professional.  I was willing to give up a degree of professionalism if it was for the sake of gaining creation-friendability (hmmm I kind of like this new word) and uniqueness however.
4. It had to be feasible.  This is perhaps the one I was most willing to give in on.  Odd but true.

I’m sure you are noting two things right now:  First, these are all relative.  Second, the Greenerprinter option pretty much satisfies these.  I know.  I know.  Let me refer you again to my insanity plea in reason #3 above.

Along the way I have considered many options.  The following are some of the more interesting ones:

• Handwritten on scraps of (already used) paper.  Just carry around a pen (preferably an eco-friendly one), find any scrap of paper, and write it out.  Easy enough.  While this achieved goals 1, 2, 4, it did not achieve #3.  It was neither professional nor terribly unique.  Of course, it looks even worse when your handwriting is as bad as mine (above writing is about as good as it gets).  So I had to pass. 
• Printed on leaves.  This certainly achieved goals 1 & 2.  While itdidn’t exactly accomplish #3 I was willing to give in here because it would be so stinking cool.  However, feasibility was a big problem.  First, it would be very difficult to get the ink on the leaves cleanly (note the failure to do so in the image above).  Second, it would also be difficult to get the ink to dry well and stay on the leaf.  Thirdly, it’s not exactly realistic to carry a stack of leaf business cards around in your wallet.  Not very durable or portable.  Tempting, but it would have to wait.  Perhaps for a conference sometime.
• Portable custom stamp inked onto any available object.  This sounded so cool.  Have a custom, self-inking stamp made that you would take everywhere and stamp it on whatever was handy.  Possible targets would include:  notebooks, hands, newspapers, books, trash, clothing, etc.  The possibilities are endless and so much fun to think about.  This would achieve goal #1.  Again, I was willing to give in on #3 because of the uniqueness.  Unfortunately, because of the size of business cards and the fact that the stamp would be custom the cost was quite high (if you could even find them that big 2 x 3 1/2).  Also, it is not too practical to carry a big old stamp around everywhere.  Sadly, this too would not work.

I went on for weeks and weeks, comparing different options to see if they met my criteria.  Some came close.  Most didn’t.  In the end I have developed a two-pronged strategy.

Strategy 1:  Digital business cards

The first part of my strategy opts out of the traditional business card approach.  I have created both a vCard and a jpeg image of my business card.  Both are now stored on my phone.  When needing to share contact info, I can quickly text or email one of my digital business cards.  No paper.  No printing.  No shipping.  No wasted inventory.  No bulky items to carry around.  No waste from data being entered into Outlook and then having the card tossed into the trash.

It seems that this option achieves all four of my goals.  While not the most professional route, I think it works.  For the most part it is a practical solution that gets the job done.  At the same time it does not allow the recipient the opportunity to quickly grab a card and disappear.  Nor can you write a note on the back (though this could be included in the email).  But in the end, I think this is a great option.

Strategy 2:  DIY business cards on trash with vegetable ink

The second part of my strategy puts a major twist on the traditional approach.  I have opted to reuse instead of recycle (or use new paper).  I am collecting would-be trash or recycling and cutting it into 2 1/4 x 3 1/2 business cards.   The packaging from that Tinker Bell underwear we bought my potty-training daughter, from that Prius brochure, from that cereal box, from a friend’s Cheez-It’s box, from the Drumsticks that our youth group consumed, and other items are now re-purposed as Creation Hope business cards.  We have eliminated the collection, shipping, cleaning, recycling, and other related efforts and emissions.  Not only is this a good way to conserve resources, but it is unique and eye-catching.

The rest  has not been easy.  Figuring out how to get the information onto these cards has been quite the challenge. After much research I purchased a custom rubber stamp mounted on wood fromRubberStamps.net for a mere $20.  [Note the stamp was well made and arrived just 4 days after I ordered it; that’s with the cheapest, slowest shipping.]  The end result is certainly not as clean looking as something printed from a professional printer but I have been willing to sacrifice for the bigger goal here.

Now, by far the hardest part has been the inking process.  I have searched and searched trying to find soy or vegetable ink stamp pads to no avail.  This has been so frustrating.  You would think there would be an eco-friendly stamp pad option.  But it seems they don’t exist (if you know otherwise please let me know).

Here is where my wife really thinks that I have lost it.  Instead of settling for regular stamp pads at this point, I (foolishly?) chose to attempt to make my own vegetable based ink as opposed to using a petroleum-based, VOC emitting stamp pad.  Again, I had an impossible time finding instructions on how to do this.  You would think that among the countless how-to websites that help you do everything from fixing a computer to building a chicken coop to constructing a hydroponic garden in your window you could find instructions on how to do this.  In all of my looking, I only found 1 set of instructions.

So, I gathered up my ingredients: vegetable oil, granular soy lecithin, Kool Aid, and water.  I mixed them up, put them in a container with a paper towel as my stamp pad, and began stamping away.  Now, here is the part I wish I didn’t have to write.  I am two ink batches in but have not yet produced an ink that works well.  It seems to be a little too watery still and thus does not stamp crisply and cleanly onto the business card as you can see below.

I will have to continue researching and refining the ink.  In the meantime I have borrowed a regular stamp pad and done a few tests to see how it looks (see below).  If I want to justify this aspect, the ink pad is refillable (though the 2 ounce bottles come with waste of their own). But perhaps that is a stretch.

This strategy also achieves the various goals, though to differing degrees.  It most certainly achieves goals 1 & 2.  It is fairly professional, though it definitely lacks the quality a professionally printed card would have.  But, what it lacks there, it gains in terms of uniqueness.  The place this is most wanting is in terms of feasibility.  The problem is neither the card nor the stamps, it is in the ink itself.  When it’s all said and done, I am very pleased with our results.  They are created in a way that cares for creation, they are very affordable, they are fairly professional and totally unique, and they are mostly feasible.

I will continue refining my business cards, but for now I am quite satisfied and excited about how this strategy helps us to care for creation and achieve our mission.

What do you think?  Do you like this approach?  Did we succeed in our goals?  Am I totally insane?  Finally, do you have any suggestions to help us improve?  I would love to hear your ideas.

[Note: As I will be on vacation enjoying God’s creation this week, we will be looking back at some of the more popular posts from this year.]

This article was originally posted at
http://www.creationhope.com/2010/04/28/beyond-the-taco-stand/

Green Adventures: a series in which we invite you into the adventures from our journey.

I love tacos.  Now, I’m not just talking about your average Taco Bell taco.  No, I’m talking about authentic, Mexican tacos.  You know, the ones that you actually get in Mexico.  The ones from the taquería (taco stand) where they warm the tortillas and then throw in that freshly cooked meat.  Then they proceed to add on all the accoutrements including the fresh guacamole.  They’re best with carne asada but I also enjoy the al pastor, pescado (fish), and even the cabeza (head meat; not brain).  Just typing this, my mouth is salivating.

In case you are underestimating how much I love these, many of my usernames and email addresses include some variation of taco and lover.  My twitter handle:  @scottlovestacos.  At my wedding, we had Mexican food.  My favorite taquería is El Apache in Ensenada, Mexico.

Long story short:  I am a carnivore.  Well, an omnivore really, but I really enjoy meat. While I love tacos and all Mexican food, I also really enjoy eating well prepared meat. The odds of me becoming a vegetarian are very slim.

Now up until a little while ago I basically thought my meat originated in the grocery store. Of course, it’s not like I thought that a piece of steak had no history. It’s that I never thought about it, effectively removing any history it did have.

I guess in my mind (particularly due to some very good advertising here in California) I figured that these animals had happy-go-lucky farm lives prior to their journey to the local supermarket. I did not know much about what went on.  To be honest, I am not sure I wanted to know. You see, by divorcing myself from their history, I effectively dodged any moral dilemmas I might encounter when faced with the reality of their treatment.

All that said, I have been on a journey of late which has strongly impacted the way I eat.  I’m not exactly sure how it came about.  Perhaps it was watching the movie Food, Inc.  Or discovering more about how animals are typically treated in the factory farms most of our food comes from today.  Or learning about the huge ecological footprint of eating meat.  Or participating in Meatless Monday.  Or from all that I have learned from Ben DeVries and the work of Not One Sparrow.  More likely it was some combination of all these things.

The first step in this journey has been one of discovery and understanding. Through the sources listed above and a several others, the curtain has been pulled back. I have learned that there is a deep environmental cost to the meat I consume, especially beef.  I have learned that there is a much larger story behind the meat you pick up at the grocery store; that bacon, for example, didn’t began as bacon but as a pig with a history. I have learned that the image of a laid back country farm where the Wilburs are cared for, loved, and happy is not actually the case. I have learned that as creations and and fellow worshippers of God animals should receive our care and consideration.

In the second step in my journey I really took these things to heart. Between the ugly images of how animals are treated and brutalized and the balanced, inspiring words I have read at Not One Sparrow, I have come to realize that this is more than meat, it is an animal. And an animal is much more than food, it is a creation of God. I do believe that God has given us animals for our use and consumption. But He has also given them to us for our care. This journey has led me to see – not just in an abstract way – that our consumption cannot be divorced from our care. I have come to realize that I myself am complicit in the poor treatment of animals even if it is indirectly. I have come to develop a newfound respect and compassion for God’s creatures.

The third step has been to put some of this into action. For me it began with a notion that I should cut meat out of my lunches. I did this for the following reasons: to improve my health, to lessen my impact on God’s creation, and to opt of out our factory farm system a bit more. So I now go about 6 days a week without having any sort of meat for lunch.

Then came Meatless Monday. Jon Mestas, fellow blogger at Creation Hope, brought this to our communities attention. Simply put, you don’t eat meat on Mondays. While the thought of becoming a vegetarian seems daunting, I was certain I could go one day without meat.

Lastly I have made an intentional effort to choose better alternatives. This is less concrete but important nonetheless. Animals with a smaller environmental footprint are preferred. Then attempts at better options based on free-range or not, what they are fed, etc are made. To be honest we have a long way to go on this, but we are trying and moving forward.

The amazing thing to me is how easy all of this has been. Perhaps we are not yet doing much, but the steps we have taken have been quite painless. On meals or days without meat, I do not feel less fulfilled as a person. Nor am I less full. Nor has eating less meat affected my manhood or quality of life. While it does take some intentionality, it is not a hard switch.

The remainder of my journey is yet to come. In fact, we are so new to this that I have no idea where it is going to go. That said, my wife and I have been intentional about talking and exploring ways we can further change the impact of our consumption. Here are a few that we are considering (and are open to further suggestions as well):

• Discovering more about how we can consume meat in a compassionate manner
• Continuing to cut our consumption of meat, especially those with the greatest impact on creation
• Purchasing a side of beef (probably with someone else) of a grass-fed cow that has been raised locally and treated appropriately
• Raising our own chickens in our backyard for eggs and perhaps meat in order to ensure that they are well cared for
• Working to reduce waste to ensure that the cost of an animal’s life is not so that it wind up in a landfill without ever being consumed

To be honest, I am not ready to eliminate meat from my diet. As of today, I don’t think I ever will do so completely. But that does not have to prevent me from continuing my journey to eat in ways that respect the value and worth of each of God’s animals. I have not eaten my last taco. But I have eaten the last taco that thinks the meat originates at the taco stand.

Tacos are now forever changed for me. No longer is it a carne asada(marinated beef) taco; it is a taco made from a vaca (cow). No longer is it carnitas (pork), it is a cerdo (pig). No longer is it pollo (chicken), it is agallina (chicken). No longer is it pescado (fish); it is pez (fish).

The meat we consume does not come into existence at the taco stand or at the market. It has a history. It was an animal – one of God’s precious creatures. No matter where you are in your journey, I encourage you to see beyond the taco stand and into the life of the cow, the pig, the chicken, and the fish. What steps can you take to better care for each one of these unique and incredible creations.

{I originally wrote this for Not One Sparrow where it was posted as “beyond the taco stand.” Thank you to Not One Sparrow and Ben DeVries for featuring it and allowing us to use it here on Creation Hope as well.  Not One Sparrow is doing some great work being a voice for animals in the Christian community. In addition to their website you can connect with them on Facebook and Twitter.}

* Taco image from

http://www.flickr.com/photos/scaredykat/ / CC BY 2.0

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