A story for and of our times

There is a story of a man who has enormous Faith in God.

One day a terrible storm is predicted with huge floods and his hometown has to be evacuated. He refuses to leave, saying he knows his God will protect and save him.

As predicted, the storm comes and the flood waters begin to rise and a boat comes past his house with the kindly rescuers urging him to leave now. He refuses their help to leave and he repeats that he knows his God will protect and save him.

The waters rise further, flooding the lower floor of his house and forcing him to move to the upper floor of his house where he is at a window when a second boat comes by with the lifeguards telling him he must jump out and leave now, the floods are only going to get worse! Once again he thanks them for their concern but nevertheless he repeats that he is staying put, because he knows his God will protect and save him.

The storm worsens and the floods do too.

Soon the man has to climb onto the roof of his house and at this point a third boat comes for him with the desperate, panic stricken rescuers shouting over the storm that it’s now or never and he must come with them now. And the faithful, trusting man calmly shouts his thanks to them but refuses their help once again, once more repeating that he knows his God will protect and save him.

The floods rise further and they sweep the poor trusting, faithful man to his death.

When he gets to heaven he says to God. “I trusted you, God. I had faith in you. Why did you fail me?”

God replied “I sent three boats for you and my best, brave, caring people for you, to rescue you, to save you. But you did not accept the help I sent for you. You did not heed my warnings. You did not act. What more did you want me to do?”

The warnings are loud and clear.

Our planet is on fire. Our rain forests are being decimated. Our glaciers are melting and our sea levels are rising.

Our planet is experiencing floods, droughts, famines, rising temperatures and unprecedented mass extinction together with rising poverty and inequality and multiple other social, economic, environmental and ecological crises, like never before ever experienced in the history of mankind.

Yet many, like the poor, drowned, faithful man, still believe that their Governments and World Leaders, or ‘Someone’, or God, will step in and somehow save us all. That all we need to do is to maintain the status quo; to keep the economy going at all costs; to ‘go back to normal’, the ‘normal’ which has brought us to this sorry state in the first place. That all we need to do is Pray and have Faith or Meditate, and that our prayers and faith and meditations will save us. That other than that we ourselves can’t make a difference, or that we ourselves don’t need to do anything in order to be saved. That all will miraculously be well. Despite the facts and science and despite all the mounting evidence and multiple warnings going off right before our very eyes.

I was prompted to write this blog in response to a photo I saw on Facebook of the beauty of Nature with spectacular orange coloured clouds which, with a bit of imagination, could be seen as two arms with hands clasped together reaching down from the skies and which was posted with the caption, ‘LOOKS LIKE GOD IS REACHING HIS HAND DOWN HOLDING OUR HAND AND LETTING US KNOW EVERYTHING WILL BE OK! CAN I GET AN AMEN!!!!’

Perhaps, if anything, the picture should be seen the other way up and seen, if at all, as God’s hands joined in supplication to us, to #ActNOW, to #Unite to save ourselves and all of #LifeOnEarth and to save our planet itself, from the destruction which has been enabled by the divisions constructed, manipulated and used by the few to divide, control, exploit and enslave us and our planet and which our silence and inaction is allowing to be done.

Like so many others doing the rounds on social media, it is being used to keep the masses complacent and it is being used to calm and lull us into helplessly waiting for God, our Governments, or ‘Someone’ to intervene and save us from ourselves and allowing us to continue excusing ourselves for not acting now, before it is too late, and for not standing up to stop those greed blinded few who are attacking and destroying our people, peace and planet for the sake of accumulating yet more wealth, power and control for themselves at all costs, even at the cost of Life itself.

#ExtinctionIsForever #ThereIsNoPlanetB

Now is the time to hear and respond to our fellow beings: our trees and bees and all the other life forms who cannot protest and speak and act and lobby for change to save themselves and their home; our children as they plead with us to save their planet and their future; our children’s children and great, great grandchildren who are yet to be born.

#WeWantToLive

The present and the future is literally in our hands, like never before. May we be brave, compassionate and decisive enough to play our part in the urgent #ClimateActionNow that is needed right now and to set aside all our differences in order to unite and do what it takes to change and save our world, together. 💞💚🌎🌍🌏💚💞

Join Extinction Rebellion https://rebellion.global/ and everyone else already uniting and finding ways to communicate the urgency, raise awareness and act together for the sake of social justice and climate justice and to #SaveOurPlanet. 💞💚🌎🌍🌏💚💞


Wherever you are in the world, I urge you all to join, get involved with and add your support for XR, as well as for Fridays For Future, Youth Strike For Climate, and grassroots activism, etc.
https://rebellion.global/groups/#countries

SEPTEMBER 25 – GLOBAL DAY OF CLIMATE ACTION
– for more info and other Fridays For Future actions see:
https://fridaysforfuture.org/

Extinction Rebellion UK
https://extinctionrebellion.uk/

Support the CEE Bill (Climate and Ecological Emergency Bill)
https://www.ceebill.uk/

UK YOUTH CLIMATE COALITION
https://www.ukycc.com/

It’s time to stop the climate crisis. Join us if you want to get involved.
https://ukscn.org/

The Amazon Is in Crisis – Learn more from Amazon Watch
https://amazonwatch.org/

Our trees and ancient woodlands are being destroyed by the UK Government for the ecological and environmentally disastrous HS2, at a cost of over £106 billion and counting. #NHSnotHS2
https://hs2rebellion.org/