Chapter 10. Faith, Love, and Hope
Deep sustainability is rooted in the deepest principles of humanness, faith, love, and hope. Psychologists and philosophers may disagree, but there is no more fundamental principle of life than faith. Without faith, life has no purpose; it doesn’t matter what we do or don’t do, life is meaningless. We can't prove that we, humanity, the Earth, or anything else has a purpose; we must accept it as a matter of faith.
Love is the belief, without proof, in the inherent goodness of a person, place, idea, image, or other object of affection. Without love, there is no faith in the inherent goodness of life; our life, human life, or life on Earth. If life is not meant to be good, life may or may not be worth living. The world might be better off without us humans.
Finally, hope is to have faith, or believe, that it is possible to realize the inherent goodness of life; that life is meant to be purposeful and good. Hope doesn’t mean that life will be good, or even that the odds favor goodness, only that goodness is a possibility that needs only to be revealed. It is hardwired within our brains but is suppressed by selfishness and greed. Hope is the belief that if we walk our path of purpose, we will have done what we could do to help make life good for others as well as ourselves.
Faith
Faith is generally understood as having trust, confidence, or belief that something is true, without scientific proof. However, scientific inquiries never yield absolute certainty. Science can only provide a rational justification for faith or a belief that something is true. However, faith is not limited to beliefs that can be tested empirically or scientifically. Faith is most often associated with belief in religious doctrines or scriptures, or more generally, a belief in God. There is no scientific evidence linking physical phenomena on Earth or in the Universe to God. Yet, 75% to 80% of the World’s people believe in the existence of God.
Philosophers rationalize faith as an intellectual commitment or logical conclusion grounded in everyday observations and experience of reality. We see the religious scriptures revealed in the world around us and ask, if not from God, then from where? If from Nature, then what’s the difference? Science may explain how things happen, but not the why. Religious philosopher, Thomas Aquinas, wrote, “To one who has faith, no explanation is necessary. To one without faith, no explanation is possible.” Ultimately, anything we accept as truth we accept by faith.
We accept by faith that life has purpose because we see it revealed in the world around us, even though proof of its existence defies scientific verification. If people believed there was no purpose for living, they wouldn’t have any reason to get out of bed in the morning, but no reason not to. It wouldn’t make any difference what they did or didn’t do because there would be nothing they needed to do; they would have no purpose to pursue. There would be no way to distinguish right from wrong or good from bad. If we aren't meant to do anything in particular, anything we do is equally right or wrong. Even seeking pleasure and avoiding pain would be meaningless reflexes that bring no sense of satisfaction. Joy and sorrow are feelings that come from a sense that we are doing or not doing what we are meant to do. Days of leisure and relaxation are not wasted but are days of recuperation and preparation to carry on with our life’s mission. A life without purpose simply makes no sense, so the vast majority of people accept, by faith, that life has purpose.
Still, those with the conventional sustainability worldview deny or ignore the existence of purpose, at least in their professional life. If they can’t understand it, they conclude it doesn’t exist, and the inability of scientific inquiry to prove its existence confirms their conclusions. They continue to act as if their lives have purpose, as they pursue their efforts to understand how the world works, but do so without asking why or for what purpose it was designed work. They never seem to stop and consider whether we humans are an integral part of the Earth’s natural ecosystems, and whether what they are doing is working with or against the Earth’s natural progress toward a better future.
Those with a shallow sustainability worldview may accept that life has purpose, but generally accept economists’ equation of purpose with consumer preferences. Economists make no judgment regarding whether consumers’ choices are good or bad, only that choices are made to further what consumers perceive to be their purpose. A fundamental problem is that consumers’ choices and decisions only reflect those who are willing and able to participate in markets. Even in studies using “contingent valuation,” where participants are asked their “willingness to pay” for environmental benefits or “willingness to accept” environmental damages, individuals’ answers are tinted by their economic situation. Some advocates attempt to make a biological case for endangered species or an ecological case for protecting fragile ecosystems. Lacking the willingness to defend the purpose of species and ecosystems within the biosphere, of which we humans are a part, advocates retreat to weaker defenses based on economics.[i] Whether a policy, or no policy, is deemed good or bad is determined by estimates of economic costs and benefits, rather than whether the policy would further the purpose of a society. The opinions of those with less money, particularly those who live for some purpose other than making money, have little opportunity to influence the political process. This is the basic nature of shallow sustainability: the rightness or wrongness of ecological and social decisions is judged by economic costs and benefits, rather than contribution to a public purpose.
Deep sustainability is rooted in the belief, in faith, that there is a purpose for human life on Earth. Humans are meant to be responsible members and caretakers of the Earth’s integral community. This doesn’t suggest that humans are meant to be the dominant species that has a right to exterminate other species or to exploit the Earth’s resources, if it chooses to do so. Its unique powers and capacities instead mean that humanity has unique responsibilities as stewards and caretakers. If our concerns were limited to the sustainability of life on Earth in general and if there were no purpose for humanity, there would be no logical reason to be concerned about the sustainability of human civilization. So deep sustainability accepts, by faith, that there is a purpose for human life on Earth today and a continuing purpose for human civilization in the future.
Love
Love has about as many definitions as there are people who attempt to define it. Most relate to affection, attachment, or caring for another person, animal, or object. There are many kinds of love: romantic love, family love, love of country, love of God, and others. Some types of love are biological, as with sexual or familial attractions or attachments. Some are psychological or metaphysical, such as devotion to ideas, objects, country, or God. Some are fleeting, and others are enduring.
There is one overarching definition of love that I believe encompasses the others: love is a belief in the inherent goodness of a person, animal, idea, or other object of affection. “To love” is to act on that belief, to treat another person, animal, idea, image, or object as if they are inherently good. To love is an act of faith, since there is no way to prove that anyone or anything is inherently good. Love doesn’t require a logical or reasonable explanation. Falling in love and out of love are emotional or spiritual rather than rational acts.
True love expects nothing in return. “In the Rhetoric, Aristotle affirms that philos [friendship love] wishes “what you believe to be good things, not for your own sake but for his, and being inclined, so far as you can, to bring these things about.”[ii] He goes on to explain that “friendship” depends on reciprocity or the expectation of receiving something in return from the relationship. This is the social dimension of a friendship. People often have friends that they do not love; they are just friends. However, loving friends are special, and the loving aspect of friendships asks and expects nothing in return. The only reward is knowing that you have somehow contributed to the greater good by “wishing what you believe to be good things” for the object of your affection, “so far as you can, to bring these things about,” not for your sake but theirs.
The New Testament states: Love “always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”[iii] A teenager in love can see no fault in the object of his or her affection. A mother who loves her son simply will not believe the person who committed a horrendous crime is the same person she raised from a baby. Artists cling to favorite images, writers to words, and scientists to ideas as if they were the work of God. Even when love doesn’t last, it takes many betrayals to convince lovers that the objects of their affection are unworthy of their love. At the very least, relationships often end long before the love that formed and bound them fades. Regardless of whether a person falls in love without thinking or loves long after they have reason to do so, those who are “in love” are virtually blind to evidence that their faith might be unfounded.
Those with conventional and shallow sustainability worldviews would likely be dismissive or reluctant to discuss or even consider the possibility that sustainable living is an expression of love. Economists and businesses see sustainability as a rational economic issue, concerning how best to allocate or ration the use of scarce resources over time. Ecologists and biologists understand that humans are ultimately dependent on the Earth’s natural ecosystems, and see ecological sustainability as essential for self-defense. Sociologists and anthropologists understand that the health of natural ecosystems is inseparable from the health of human societies. The conventional and shallow worldviews center concerns about sustainability on its impacts on humans, but rarely, if ever, ask why. Why is it important to sustain human life on Earth? Is an environmental ethic nothing more than another human-centered ethic?
Those with the dominant or conventional worldview believe it is irrational or foolish to do anything unless there is an expectation of receiving something of greater economic value in return. The Earth is not something to be loved but instead something to be feared, exploited, or conquered. Those who hold the shallow sustainability worldview may feel a moral or ethical responsibility to care for the natural environment, mainly because doing otherwise is a threat to humanity. Some may love being in nature, the wilderness, but mainly for how it makes them feel rather than what being there does for nature. Among neither is there an abiding faith in the goodness of the Earth, or love of life, beyond human life.
Those with a deep sustainability worldview understand that human life on Earth is but a means to an end, not the ultimate purpose of sustainability. The purpose of human life is to contribute to or reveal the inherent goodness of the Earth’s integral community. Thus, deep sustainability is rooted in a love of the Earth; faith in the inherent goodness of life on Earth and the goodness of its ultimate purpose for existence. Many acts essential to enhancing the quality and integrity of life on earth, including the lives of other people, must be acts of love – made with no expectation of receiving anything of tangible value in return. Acts of love require no reciprocal action for confirmation, justification, or validation. They are simply the right thing to do.
The transition to deep sustainability must be like having a love affair with the Earth, the Universe, with God’s creation. People must come to believe, by faith, that life on Earth is meant to be good and that human civilization is worth sustaining. Authentic sustainability is only possible in societies where faith and love dominate skepticism and hate.
Hope
"Hope is not the same as joy when things are going well, or the willingness to invest in enterprises that are obviously headed for early success, but rather an ability to work for something to succeed. Hope is definitely not the same thing as optimism. It's not the conviction that something will turn out well, but the certainty that something makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. It is this hope, above all, that gives us strength to live and to continually try new things, even in conditions that [to others] seem hopeless.”[iv]
These words were written by Vaclav Havel, the writer, reformer, and President of the Czech Republic, in his 1990 book Disturbing the Peace. He was explaining what motivated people in the former Soviet Union to continue to fight for independence from Russia, one of the most powerful nations in the world at the time. He concluded:
“Life is too precious to permit its devaluation by living pointlessly, emptily, without meaning, without love and, finally, without hope." [v]
I used these quotes in my 2007 book, A Return to Common Sense. I suggested that the world was nearing a time of revolutionary change, from the relentless pursuit of wealth and economic growth to the quest for ecological, social, and economic sustainability. I wrote:
When we look around us, we might see little evidence of a new revolution. People seem to be too busy working and shopping to pay much attention to other people or to the natural environment. Empathy and ethics may seem to be losing ground to selfishness and greed. Things are not necessarily going well, and there may be little reason for joy. But as long as we have the ability to continue believing in and working for something better, there is hope.
How can I be sure that the world is nearing a time of revolutionary change? I can’t be sure, but I can still have hope. Hope is grounded in the possibility of something better, not the certainty of something better. We only need hope, not certainty, to motivate us to continue working toward a better world, for ourselves and for others, both now and in the future. I have hope that we are nearing a time of great transformation in human history that quite literally will change the world. And hope is all I need.[vi]
I have spent most of my professional life working for what many would call “lost causes.” I have defended family farms and rural communities against the industrialization of American agriculture. I have helped countless people fight losing battles to protect their communities from large-scale concentrated animal feeding operations, or CAFOs. I told the people, and still believe, that every battle was an opportunity to inform people of the downside of CAFOs, and an informed public would ultimately win the war. I have supported and encouraged the organic farmers, biodynamic farmers, ecological farmers, sustainable farmers, and regenerative farmers to refuse to compromise their integrity, even after corporate agri-business has co-opted and corrupted the movements they created. I still believe they are creating the future of food and farming. I fought the Land Grant University System’s shift from supporting independent family farms to supporting corporately controlled industrial agricultural operations. I have since retired from the system, but continue work to reform it. I have criticized neoclassical economists for ignoring the essentials for economically competitive markets and have opposed both political parties for abandoning the common people to favor their corporate and billionaire donors.
I haven’t won any of these battles, but the battles I have fought have made sense, and I am convinced they were the right thing for me to do. If they are ever won, the victories won’t be quick or easy, and there is no certainty that they will ever be won. Even among those who are serious about sustainability, the changes necessary for “deep sustainability” probably seem beyond realistic possibility. However, I know that a better world is possible. I feel it in the continued inspiration to write and respond to requests for information as my professional career and life wind down. I have seen glimpses of it among the people I have met in supporting and promoting my various lost causes. I believe in these people, particularly the young people. The deep thinkers and doers may be a small minority, but they exist, and their existence confirms the possibility of others to follow. I am convinced that the sustainability revolution is still coming, and is 20 years closer than when I wrote the Return to Common Sense.
The conventional sustainability worldview is that there is no reason for concern. As economic opportunities arise to address ecological and social problems, new technologies will emerge to address them. Artificial intelligence is the new “technological silver bullet” that will bring forth a new level of economic prosperity, alleviate concerns about resource scarcity and environmental pollution, and employ robots to do the work humans don’t want to do. There seems to be little consideration of whether replacing human workers with computers, drones, and robots actually makes sense. What’s the purpose of people? Are people meant to support the economy, or is the economy meant to support the people? What will corporations do about the economic surplus of people who are replaced by the next wave of “labor-saving” technology? Optimistic investors are betting billions of dollars on the expectation of quick profits, not on the possibility or hope of employing more people or paying them more for working less.
Those holding the shallow sustainability worldview base their hope for the future on whatever set of statistics they believe most critical in sustaining human life on Earth. They look at calculations of how fast the Earth is warming and estimates of how much time is left to reduce greenhouse gas emissions before the Earth inevitably becomes uninhabitable for humans. They look at species extinction statistics and estimate how many more species can be lost before we destroy the integrity of the living ecosystems that we are part of, and thus destroy ourselves. Their hope is based on science, statistics, and probabilities. If the probabilities of success, or avoiding disaster, are large, they are hopeful. If the probabilities of success are small, they are less so. If they see no statistically significant probability for success, they feel helpless and hopeless.
There is no reason for optimism or prospects for early success in the movement toward ecological, social, and economic sustainability. There is little reason for optimism or expectations for imminent success, or even for significant change in the foreseeable future. There is no assurance that society, particularly American society, will ever choose sustainability over selfishness and greed. So why should we continue to invest time, energy, and money in sustainability when the prospects for a positive outcome seem so dim? Because we know that doing so makes sense, regardless of how it turns out. Because we know, by faith, that it is the right and good thing to do. I know now that I will not live to see the outcome of the sustainability revolution, but that doesn’t matter. I have done the best I could do. I still have hope that what I have done has or will contribute to the greater goodness of humanity, the Earth, and beyond. Quoting Nelson Mandela, "It always seems impossible, until it is done."
People often ask me if I am optimistic about the future. My standard answer is that I am not optimistic, but hopeful. I believe, by faith, that there is a purpose for human life on Earth. By faith, I believe that the purpose of life on Earth, including human life, is good. I believe in the inherent goodness of people, of life, of the living Earth. I love life. And finally, I know it is possible that this goodness can be revealed and this love confirmed by the actions of people. Quoting Nelson Mandela, "It always seems impossible, until it is done." In faith and love, there is always hope. Regardless...
“Life is too precious to permit its devaluation by living pointlessly, emptily, without meaning, without love and, finally, without hope."
John Ikerd
Notes:
[i] Herman Daly. April 15, 2013. The Lurking Inconsistency. Center for the Advancement of the Steady State Economy - http://steadystate.org
[ii] Wikipedia contributors, "Rhetoric (Aristotle)," Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Rhetoric_(Aristotle)&oldid=1325586847
[iii] Bible Gateway. 1 Corinthians 13:4-8. https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=1+Corinthians+13:4-8
[iv] Vaclav Havel, Disturbing the Peace (New York: Random House Inc., 1990), 181-182.
[v] Havel, Disturbing the Peace, 188.
[vi] John Ikerd. A Return to Common Sense. R.T. Edwards Inc., Philadelphia, PA. 2007.