You Are What You Eat 2 – A Life Here and Now

This is the second and last post inspired through ‘Our Daily Bread’, a documentary by the Austrian film maker ..., about contemporary food industry.

As I watch, I feel powerless. This industrial complex is too huge to fight. And where should one start? It’s so hard to change habits. Moreover, changing consumer patterns takes discipline, perseverance and will probably cost quite a bit. The more you think about it, the more ways there seem to be to do ‘wrong’. (Some hold that if the whole world would switch to ecologically grown food we would need to cut down all forests and more, because the yield per area is lower.) And if we’d individually succeed to consume responsibly, it would still not substantially change a whole industrial complex. It’s like David against Goliath.

(And yet, I do believe that a little shepherd boy can defeat a giant. In the Bible, it seems like God often chooses the little guy to defeat unruly systems, which is very encouraging to me.)

I believe that Christians are not only called for a life hereafter, but for a life here and now, a redeeming life. One of my goals (call it a ‘New Year’s Resolution’ if you want) is to find out how I should adopt a more responsible lifestyle as a follower of Christ, which includes such fundamental things as food and drink.

You Are What You Eat 1 – An Industry

Photo downloaded from: www.ourdailybread.at.

• Thousands of feathery yellow chicks roll from one conveyor belt to an other, a machine spews out the chicks and sorts them in crates.

• Pigs are forced into a walkway, on a parallel conveyor line they witness other pigs dragged upside down on hooks, dripping blood. They shriek as they are forced into a slaughtering machine.
  
• A group of low paid eastern European workers are harvesting asparagus under a threatening dark and grey sky.

Just a few random scenes in ‘Our Daily Bread’, a documentary by the Austrian film maker Nikolaus Geyrhalter, about contemporary food industry. Without voice-over, no dialogue, no music, only the sounds on the spot, it is clear: industry is really a suitable word. Although, food is so intricately bound with nature, contemporary production seems so far from it. A chicken is not a chicken, a pig is not a pig and a cow is not a cow, separated from the rest of creation they are just another commodity. What disturbs most is not the slaughtering, but the separation of parts of original creation from all the rest. Is a chick still a chick when it never saw its mother, never saw the light of the day, and never walked on soil? Would a pig know how to be a pig in a dark barn, in booths to small to even turn, while being force-fed?

What if there’s some truth in the statement ‘you are what you eat’*? That would make us rather ugly. Indeed, it is not only animals and inanimate creation that suffer from modern food industry. What about the girl separating steaming pigs’ guts in the slaughter house all day or the aforementioned asparagus harvesters? Surely they have dreamt about other professions. Their kinds of profession are, what we call in Dutch, mind deadening.

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* This quote by the German philosopher Ludwig Feuerbach is especially interesting in the light of the last supper, when Jesus broke bread and shared wine for his disciples to remember the sacrifice he was going to make on the Cross.

Bali Souvenir

I was momentarily lost in non-cyberspace, not posting on my blog for weeks. But I'm back again with a short series of long expected postings on my travels on Indonesia.

When I think of Indonesia, I hear the monotomous but comforting sounds of a gamelans, I smell an exciting blend of tropical spices and I see sawahs patched against imposing mountains. Although these images somewhat correspond with the truth, Indonesia is much more. I guess my view of Indonesia is very influenced by history lessons, and art and culture in the Netherlands.

My image of Indonesia, and I believe not only mine when I visit the Tropical Museum in Amsterdam, is very Bali dominated. It's only one of thousands of islands, but the air of mystique and ancient myths of Bali have inspired so many colonials, tourists and artists that it imprinted upon many as the heart and soul of Indonesia.

In the following you'll find some impressions from my photos from travels in Bali. More is available on my flickr account. Some of my friends (travel mates and collegues) have also posted on travels in Indonesia, click on the names for their reports: Aysem, Harro, Rob and Timme.

Bid voor de ChristenUnie

(foto NRC: Bas Czerwinski)

"Bid voor alle gezagsdragers, opdat we rustig en ongestoord kunnen leven, in alle vroomheid en waardigheid" 1 Timoteüs 2:2 (NBV)

Vandaag krijgen we te horen of de formatiebesprekingen voor een Christelijk sociaal kabinet (CDA-PvdA-ChristenUnie) worden voortgezet. Persoonlijk hoop ik op een vervolg. Wat ook de uitkomst echter moge zijn, roep ik op tot gebed voor bescherming van - met name - onze Christelijke gezagsdragers. Juist het politieke vak is er één van vele verleidingen, zoals trots en opportunisme.

In de media wordt vaak een karikatuur geschetst van de ChristenUnie. Hoewel ik mij daaraan erger, denk ik ook: waarom nu juist de ChristenUnie? Positief beschouwd is er kennelijk iets met de ChristenUnie dat duidelijk wordt herkend als Christelijk. De ChristenUnie verkeert in een unieke positie nog zichtbaarder te worden in Nederland door deel te nemen aan het kabinet. Dit heeft niet alleen een beleidseffect, maar ook een cognitief en mogelijk geestelijk effect. Mensen, vooral niet-gelovigen, kunnen worden bevestigd in hun (negatieve) ideeën over Christenen of juist verrast staan over de betrokkenheid en relevantie van de Christelijke boodschap voor Nederland.
Natuurlijk moet deze grotere zichtbaarheid niet in de eerste plaats worden nagestreefd om de populariteit of het toekomstig electoraal succes van de partij. Integendeel, zoals Christenen ambassadeurs behoren te zijn van Christus, behoort de ChristenUnie Christus'ambassadeur te zijn in het Nederlands politiek bedrijf.

Welbeschouwd is het dragen van de titel van Christus in de naam een zware verantwoordelijkheid. De ChristenUnie doet dat en heeft dus deze verantwoordelijkheid op zich genomen: het eren van Gods naam. Of de ChristenUnie nu in de regering komt of oppositie voert, bidden we om genade om Christus te kunnen vertegenwoordigen in de politiek en in de samenleving.

HAPPY 2007