Be Anxious About What You Are ...

This week we are looking at human consumption and the impact it has on the environment. As with much of what we discuss here at St. Francis, God intends a balanced approach to the matter.

On one end of the spectrum you have human avarice or extreme greed, and on the other end you have pantheism or the worship of nature. Neither is good.

To strike the balance between these to extremes it would be wise to heed this simple exhortation by St. Gregory the Great, “Don’t be anxious about what you have, but about what you are.”

If your focus is on your want, it will naturally lead to greed. So, don’t be anxious about what you have.

If your focus is on what you are — a servant of the Lord created in His image — then worshiping anything but God is foolishness. So, be anxious about what you are.

It is also important to recognize that this balance between greed and false worship actually applies to more than resources for food.

Along these lines, Albert Einstein quipped, “The environment is everything that isn’t me.”

In other words, we should see ourselves as servants of the Lord in all things, from planting a seed in the garden to growing a relationship with another person.

In the end we need to remember that “consumption” is simply defined as using up a resource. Such a resource can be food, water, energy, land, or the most valuable resource of all – one another.

Going back to St. Gregory’s instruction, if we are anxious about what we are – servants of the Lord created in His image – we will want to model Christ, the greatest example of such in history.

Christ did not come to consume, Christ came to be consumed.