Silly United Church of Canada! Two summers ago our General Council, the national gathering of delegates, decided to ban bottled water from its meetings and encouraged congregations across the country to "get off the bottle." The media picked up the story and soon we were being criticized from inside and out. What a dopey thing to address in a national meeting of a church, many thought. Who are these people to tell me not to drink bottled water, some of our folk commented. Even though the reasoning was made clear -- we shouldn't commodify a basic right for everyone and we shouldn't clog our landfills with more plastic -- folk weren't impressed.
Well, it has been an interesting 18 months. Over and over again the real dopiness of paying a relative fortune for what flows from the taps has been brought to our attention. Not just by church groups, although many other denominations have followed suit. There have been articles in the New York Times and Time magazine and countless other sources of news and commentary.
This week Toronto council considered a motion to tax water bottles so that people would be discouraged from creating so much needless waste. The same Andy Barrie I challenged with an email yesterday wondered aloud if the day will come when we recognize the sheer folly of filling glass bottles with water in France, shipping them to North American, then guzzling the contents in a few moments before tossing them away. I agree with him whole-heartedly, as I usually do.
Maybe we're not so silly after all.
Well, it has been an interesting 18 months. Over and over again the real dopiness of paying a relative fortune for what flows from the taps has been brought to our attention. Not just by church groups, although many other denominations have followed suit. There have been articles in the New York Times and Time magazine and countless other sources of news and commentary.
This week Toronto council considered a motion to tax water bottles so that people would be discouraged from creating so much needless waste. The same Andy Barrie I challenged with an email yesterday wondered aloud if the day will come when we recognize the sheer folly of filling glass bottles with water in France, shipping them to North American, then guzzling the contents in a few moments before tossing them away. I agree with him whole-heartedly, as I usually do.
Maybe we're not so silly after all.
2 comments:
Now there are some of us, who enjoy the taste of bottled water... And I am certainly one of them. :)
What I do, is use the Canadian Springs 18L bottles, that I have delievered to my home, and refill 1 bottle that I bought repeatedly. Thereby, enjoying the water I like, and not polluting the environment. :)
Sounds like a good compromise Adam.
We do have a water cooler in the church office. Those bottles are big and refillable, although they are chipped and the plastic shipped to China for recycling as kids toys.
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