EXTINCTION: US, WE, OURSELVES
When I was small, I wanted to become a missionary in what then was called The Netherlands East Indies, now Indonesia. Our denomination had two missionaries there, in a remote part of Celebes called Toratja Land, where ‘head hunters’ were active, not the modern ones that recruit up-and-coming executives for important positions in the corporate world, but natives who specialized in cutting off and bringing home the severed heads of their enemies. On the so-called ‘mission day’ these missionaries, on their furlough back home after 6 years of difficult work, would make the tour of the Netherlands, always showing off one of their converts, brown, small humans, then a novelty to behold. These missionaries had learned the indigenous language and used the Bible as the only tool for conversion to Christianity, declaring the native religions as pagan and devilish.
What these indigenous people knew, and the innocent white, did not, was that they, in their historic way, practiced population control, because too many people, too few animals, too little natural edibles, would soon lead to extinction and death for all. Granted, it was a cruel way, not at all the European way of thinking, but still, death for some meant life for others: the law of the jungle, and for them the only way to prevent overpopulation. We, smart Westerners, failed to check this overpopulation phenomenon and also over-expanded our resource use, so, now we, the supposedly more humane humans, are going extinct.
Are we? Yes.
The animals know this and, in the deep recesses of our hearts, we know this too. Sensing the imminent death of all species, the subconscious understanding of our common fate is making us ill, but our nervous and physical systems cannot bear this terrible knowledge, so we bury it deep behind our shadow with the obvious result that we unknowingly suffer from a novel mental disorder: our brand-new Extinction Illness. Yes, we all know it.
Is that really true? Yes, contemplating the extent and pervasiveness of despair and violence across the globe, the rapid growth of irrationality in human and animal behavior, the melting polar ice, the unstoppable methane release, I increasingly believe that all humans and non-humans know this: the animals, the trees and birds, the insects and fish, they all know this. There is something like a cognitive consonance out there: the news traveling from tree to tree, from bird to bird, whispering through the air, magically, and affecting also us, imperceptive and inconsiderate ignoramuses.
It’s not only the Pandemic, that’s only part of it: we all are being driven to some form of madness, pain, or dysfunction. For the animals, Bear, Wolf, Elephant, Whale this results in unavoidable and unmediated terror. We humans know, with or without awareness, that we are responsible. And so, we, entirely crazed, become a species that commits ecocide even as we die of it ourselves. The different signs and symptoms are ubiquitous and no one is escaping it.
We know we are going extinct. We know this consciously and/or unconsciously. Each person on the planet knows this. Extinction is upon us and no one is immune to it. All beings sense our/their imminent death. Not only their individual deaths, but far worse, the death of their species. An unbearable thought. And beyond that, the death of all species ….
It is possible that Extinction Illness is the root of all contemporary mental, physical, and spiritual diseases. Extinction Illness, the essential cellular knowledge and terror that one’s life, one’s people’s lives, all life is threatened, that lineage is disappearing, that we all, may well become extinct within a very short period of time, that the future will be eradicated.
The fire of knowing sweeps down upon us like a tornado and there is no place to run. There is no escape. And worse, we do not get to live our ordinary lives until the moment of Extinction. Much suffering is inevitable before our demise in whichever way it will come to any one of us. That’s why the predictable prelude arises: Extinction illness – our bodies, minds, souls reeling with the terrible reality of what we have done, are doing, because extinction is our fault.
Believe it or not…….
Whether or not we ‘believe’ the scientists who say climate change is Anthropocene – human-induced – Climate Disruption, meaning we, mere mortals, are the cause: we know extinction and our role in it. Even those who don’t want to acknowledge or accept the reality of the 6th Extinction or Climate Change or Disruption or recognize the consequences of the bleaching of the barrier reefs, the glaciers and poles melting, the acidification of the oceans, the extreme weather shifts, deadly floods, year-long and increasingly intense fire seasons, wind tornadoes and fire tornadoes, the insect apocalypse, the collapse of fisheries, deforestation, desertification and 17,000 species threatened at this time, they know. The unconscious knows. The soul knows. The connected life system knows even if the individual isn’t consciously aware. He/she/they/we were born into the network of all life and Life knows too. Christians especially should know: the entire Bible testifies to that event conclusively. Malachi – one of the many prophets – in the Hebrew Bible, Jesus in Matthew 24, Paul in Romans 8, Peter in 2 Peter 3, John in many chapters of Revelation: they all speak of the end to come in no uncertain terms. The entire Bible speaks with great longing for the Great Coming of the Lord, the so-called Parousia.
Warnings galore.
Yes, there are many warnings. The March 18 ARCTIC NEWS, endorsed by 30 scientists, is one of them: totally and frighteningly believable. It gives us no more than 5 years. Gail Tverberg, a knowledgeable actuary, in her March 20 Our Finite World, asserts that our financial system will collapse in less than 2 years, possibly taking away our electrical network: these blogs are there for all to see.
As there is no antidote for Extinction, the Extinction Illness is incurable: no anti-biotic, no anti-depressant or anti-psychotic, no sedative, no bone marrow transplant, no chemotherapy, no pesticide, no radiation therapy: not even fervent prayer will do it. There is no personal healing for these conditions and treating or focusing on the symptoms is counter-productive and exacerbates our common jeopardy.
Here we are. We are all suffering a life-threatening illness for which there is no discoverable cure. How shall we meet it?
As an innocent youngster I wanted to become a missionary. Good thing I never did, not really knowing the Message. I now know that we always lived on a planet which, almost right from the start was destined for extinction: God withdrew, and, as Deuteronomy 31 attests, “hid his face to see what our end will be.” Well, now we know the outcome.
However, Jesus God’s Son, came to restore creation and extinguish extinction. That will happen soon.
I love that text in Revelation 21, where all is well that ends well:
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and earth had passed away, and the sea was no more.
I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying:
“Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man,
and He will dwell with them.
They will be His people,
and God Himself will be with them as their God.
‘He will wipe away every tear from their eyes,’
and there will be no more death
or mourning or crying or pain,
for the former things have passed away.”
When I was a grade school kid, I wanted to become a missionary. Perhaps that youthful desire really never disappeared. The most visitors to my blog, which I now see as a missionary tool, are from the USA, Canada, China and the U.K in that order.
P.S. I owe some of these thoughts to an article I read some years ago in TIKKUN, a Jewish publication.