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Show WHAT ABOUT SINS AGAINST THE EARTH? Dear Mr. Stiles, The local newspaper headline last Monday, March 13, 2000, was “Pope repents sins in the name of the church” and there were probably similar front page captions in papers all over the world. The article that followed (by a Los Angeles Times writer*) said, “Pope John Paul II begged God's forgiveness...for sins...by Roman Catholics over the past 2000 years...” and continued on to fill most of an inside page. The pope's “Day of Pardon Mass” words to his flock of about a billion members, and MORE ON FUNAFUTI... Jim, So it has been your dream to travel to Funafuti? I bet you didn’t know that quite a few Utahns have been sharing this dream for awhile now. Attached is a description of the TIMES project (on the fascinating Tuvalu OnLine website). This year, TIMES will only be sailing to three of the Outer Islands (viz. Nanumea, Nanumaga and Niutao) with a small team of volunteer "quarter makers". During the next five years, however, we plan to carry out an ambitious plan to put medical and educational volunteers on the Outer Islands and to establish improved telecommunication and transportation links (e.g. by reintroducing Polynesian-style sailing canoes!). Not only are these the friendliest people in the South Pacific, maintaining a traditional . Polynesian lifestyle on some of the last unspoiled atolls; also we owe them something for their help in WWII (on Funafuti they gave up all of their arable land so we could put in a landing strip). You may, or may not, know that the US Peace Corps pulled out in the early nineties because inter-island transportation had degraded to the point that the medical safety of their young volunteers could no longer be guaranteed. TIMES is ready to go back in with our own means of transportation (volunteer sailing vessels), our own doctors, our own teachers and our own satellite communication equipment. In five years we will be happy to pull back out also, but not before giving them a shot at restoring their ancient tradition of being able to take care of their little island paradise and themselves. Will they sink into the ocean within 50, 500 or 5000 years? Nobody knows. Right now, however, they can use some real help. _ Regards, Henk Meuzelaar TIMES Volunteer Project Coordinator PS. ; When I read this message over I realized that you may never have seen so many cliches together in so few paragraphs. However, sometimes life has no choice but to imitate art (or even kitsch)...... HM _A FEW THOUGHTS im, ON NED CHAFFIN... And why? He tells of Chaffin's “growing-up-years” and reading this tale, one realizes how important those years are in our lives. The word is, impressionability, a noun. Chaffin was all of that when he met those folks, who called upon the canyon looking for archaeological sites. It was the same canyon where the 16 year old Chaffin and his brothers looked after their cattle. For two years he worked with this archaeological team, and as a or be consigned to early extinction through human action...in the next thirty years.” These quoted words were written in 1993 by Edward O. Wilson, one of the most brilliant, renown and humane scientists in the world today (also a great writer having been awarded two Pulitzer prizes). Surely the damage we have done and are continuing to do to our Earth home and other living species-and our descendants--is a sin, if the word can be defined at all. A first thought I had after reading the pope's “landmark public confession” was, how could he and his Vatican advisors ignore such a sin against nature? Or, saying this another way, how could they, in their position of power to guide millions of people --and having the responsibility that accompanies that power--not address the issues of habitat destruction and extinctions of world species, of which humans are a part and at risk with all the rest? I'm afraid the answer is that they and other world leaders, not only religious but also political and industrial, with the power to lead change, are blinkered and anthropocentric. They just don't understand, in my view, that humanity and nature are bound together. A second thought I had was about the world religion centered out there in Utah—not the magnitude of the Pope's in numbers, but big and growing, When the LDS Spring Conference is held next month and becomes a Utah world podium, at least for millions of Mormons, will church high authorities speak up about earth-threatening issues like destruction of habitats and extinctions of living species? Or even about preserving Utah's natural wilderness places that are left? I don't think so, but I hope I'm wrong. A last thought is mostly conjecture and about another brilliant writer named Edward. What would he have written if he were alive and had been back here visiting his native ground in Home, Pennsylvania and seen the Vatican headline in the Indiana, PA Gazette? I thinkI can guess the tenor of his thoughts about the Pope's confession, but it's impossible for me or anyone else to express them in a way that only Abbey could. Too bad, but his words of the past still speak out for us: “It is not enough to understand the natural world; the point is to defend and preserve it.” ; Sincerely, Robert Roylance Fox Chapel Borough, Pennsylvania (50 miles west of Home, PA) * Writer Richard Boudreaux of the Los Angeles Times LETTERS TO FEEDBACK Write to The Zephyr at: P.O. Box 327, Moab, UT 84532 or Email at: zephyr@lasal.net Letters of the Month are chosen erratically and randomly by the publisher. result, had stories to tell and made some money, but his life soon changed. : Chaffin tells more from his perspective 70 years later, saying, “It was a different environment than I was used to. It was like being in school, being around people who were interested in education. It was stimulating. It gave me a new outlook on who had been there before, and how they lived.” He realized they were hunting, gathering and He knew how important those years were for him. He had no regrets from leaving his life of ranching. Scholl couldn't put a moral at the end of his tale, as maybe he was leaving the moral to me. Give your children as much adventure and experience as you possibly can, as they need it to develop into the person they want to be. And remember the importance of those last chance years, from 8 to 16 and a few years more. a of habitat alteration continues unchecked, 20% or more of the Earth's species will disappear It's a bit unsporting to rail at the pope on St. Patrick's Day, I suppose, but that was unplanned, and I apologize to Irish friends and kin. Parents should take heed, and read Barry Scholl's tale on Ned Chaffin in -the March agricultural people. no doubt read by just as many not in his fold, divided sins into several categories such as “sins against Christian unity, sins against other religions and cultures” but said absolutely nothing about humans' actions that have violated the natural world. During his lifetime, and under his observation we have perilously damaged the Earth and “...if the current rate Sincerely, Herb Steiner Seattle TESTICULAR FORTITUDE? Jim Stiles, Just a note to tell you how much I enjoy the Zephyr. 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