Cod by Mark Kurlansky

[James]

Clare,

You have made a lot of good points.

My point is focused on the fact, that over 50 years ago there was a vote in the Catholic Church by church leadership to evaluate women's health with respect to the physical impacts to women's health & body to having too many children. The vote was a positive outcome that yes, this is a very real concern & as a result the traditional position in the church on birth control should be CHANGED.

When you add the carrying capacity relationship between too many people needing access to resources, like fresh water, that are limited to the health concerns of women you have a stronger position to accept the majority vote that happen in 1965 &. To reopen this discussion in the church today.

Standard of living, using a large amount of resources per person, must also be factored in. We in the US live at a very high standard of living.

Let's also not lose sight of the fact that not too long ago, 100 years or less, that large families were encouraged to work the family farm & protect the farm & village against invaders wanting to steal their agriculture & land resources.

My position therefore is simple & direct on the fact that the church showed an understanding toward women's health with respect to having too many children. Let's not sweep this fact under the rug & not take a position to build on this historic breakthrough vote with church thinking. And that we need to build on this outcome by adding the carrying capacity of human numbers relationship to a shrinking resource supply.

I also support all of your statements, but let's not cloud the issue with a need to reopen this issue with present day church leaders, because the need to do so has become even more necessary with our present doubling of the world's population.

And the facts:

40% of the land in the world is in agriculture

Plant & animal species are going extinct every year because of human populations displacing their habitat

25% of the rivers in the world do not reach the ocean including the Colorado River, because the water is used by people.

1/3 of agriculture water comes from aquifers, which are running out

2 billion more people will arrive in 2050

Chairman Mao's relationship with nature caused between 35 & 50 million people to starve

3000 pesticides are registered with the Colorado Dept of agriculture & no one can know their impacts on humans

The world bank is buying grazing land in Africa to put into agriculture , the grasslands are where most of the wildlife populations are in Africa & is the more fertile land.

Your concerns, Clare also need to be addressed, & a church change on birth control policy will also help to do this.

JK

[James]

Hello,

Here are 2 more books that I would like to suggest for reading:

"At Home In The Cosmos" by David Toolan &
"The Great Work" by Thomas Berry

The Great Work is about saving the planet.

Both authors are Jesuits. The Jesuits are the scholars in the Catholic Church. Both books are about the spiritual human relationship with nature. Both books support birth control.

In Toolan's book on pages 76 & 77 he explains how American Corporations spent 1/2 a billion dollars per year to destroy the Environmental Movement of the 60s, a story not found in too many places.

If you view Roman as the administrators of church policy that find it easier to say, "no" you need to read what the scholars have to say about Christian ethics & values as to how they pertain to the human relationship with nature. These books do a good job of presenting this perspective.

One of the more interesting debates in the church is over the question, who is the Church? Is it the authority of Rome or is it the collective consciousness of the congregation?

The values & ethics of religion is important in the human relationship with nature debate because it influences people in profound ways. And most important, when these spiritual perspectives are considered, a connection between social justice & environmental justice will emerge.

Environmentalists have been trying to deal with the symptoms of a value system that worships greed & money as a god for 50 years & environmental problems, like global warming, have become more & more gigantic.

Of course, we should always work with local problems, but have we been ignoring religion & spiritual input & influences because we don't t feel comfortable with them?

Is the old method of dealing with symptoms one at a time solving the problem, or do we need to attack the greed & money values & ethics that are causing these symptom abuses of nature, & create a new & powerful value system that provides an umbrella perspective that automaticly provides a broad consciousness that deals with the prevention of them where & before they start, a place that creates values for a healthy nature mechanism that supports all life on the planet.

HAVE Religious & spiritual values been ruled out of the discussion for too long?

All religions support a non-destructive relationship with nature. So, we do not have to re-invent the wheel.

Jim K

[Jimmy]

I just finished the sequel to Cod. My review is available there.

by Mark Kurlansky

[Jimmy]

It provides an excellent history of Gloucester, Massachusetts, and the fishing industry.

[Clare]

Thanks!
I'm currently reading The Narrow Edge: A Tiny Bird, an Ancient Crab, and an Epic Journey

This is about shore birds and horseshoe crabs all the way up the east coast of the Americas, so the books might complement each other. Horseshoe crabs have been heavily caught for bait and their blood is now used by the medical industry.

[Jimmy]

The red knot is one of the most fascinating birds I have ever studied. They deserve a thread of their own soon in our animal folder.

[Jimmy]

The decline of the West Coast America sardine population:

http://www.ecowatch.com/sardine-fishe...

[Barbara]

I'm late to this conversation, but would like to suggest a book: "The Most Important Fish in the Sea," by H. Bruce Franklin. Franklin lays out the sad saga of the menhaden, or "pogy" as they are called in Main, and "bunker" to the south. They used to travel in dense schools miles long and wide. Each fish could filter between 4 and 6 gallons of water per minute, so the pony helped clean the ocean. The pogy is so rich in oil that once whales were decimated, the pogy were pressed to lubricate the engines of the new industrial revolution. Maine fishermen pleaded for legislation to stop the slaughter because they knew the pogy, the best bait fish, were essential to cod that require a fat rich diet in order to spawn. There's a lot more to learn from this remarkable book and it was an important resource for me in writing my second novel: "The Other Island: Ben's Story" about the disastrous loss of ground-fishing in the Gulf of Maine.

[Clare]

Hi Jimmy,
I have just spotted 'Cod' in a secondhand shop and grabbed it, so thanks for bringing it to my attention. I'm looking forward to the read when I get a chance.

[Jimmy]

I'm glad. Hope you enjoy it.

[Clare]

I've just finished reviewing another book about ocean fish, which I can recommend.
Upstream: Searching for Wild Salmon, from River to Table

[Barbara]

Mark Kurlansky also wrote a children's book titled "The Cod's Tale" that is wonderful. I was fortunate to pick it up on sale for a fraction of the original cost.

[Jimmy]

Thank you for the tips, Clare and Barbara.

Here is The Cod's Tale:

by Mark Kurlansky

[Clare]

Latest by the same author:
Salmon: A Fish, the Earth, and the History of a Common Fate

[Jimmy]

Thanks, Clare. I am almost afraid to read it because I already know the situation with salmon is dire.