Step by step: faithfully seeking climate justice

The ‘Little One’ we await teaches us how to make home wherever we go

by abby mohaupt | Special to Presbyterian News Service

abby mohaupt

In those days Caesar Augustus declared that everyone throughout the empire should be enrolled in the tax lists. This first enrollment occurred when Quirinius governed Syria. Everyone went to their own cities to be enrolled. Since Joseph belonged to David’s house and family line, he went up from the city of Nazareth in Galilee to David’s city, called Bethlehem, in Judea. He went to be enrolled together with Mary, who was promised to him in marriage and who was pregnant. While they were there, the time came for Mary to have her baby. She gave birth to her firstborn child, a son, wrapped him snugly, and laid him in a manger, because there was no place for them in the guest room.

— Luke 2:1-6 (Common English Bible)

I wish I was home for Christmas. Home means eating cinnamon rolls made by my mom, playing with my nieces and nephews, meeting up with friends we haven’t seen all year. Home means getting to have cheese fries at my favorite restaurant and hugging my partner’s 80-year- old grandmother who I love like my own.

But earlier this month, my partner and I traveled to the Mexico-Texas border to meet and support (in our own small way) asylees who have left their homes to come north. We went with the PC(USA) Wall of Welcome, joining students from Austin Presbyterian Theological Seminary and leaders of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). We went to listen and to learn. It felt necessary to leave our homes. We needed to welcome those who had journeyed so far in order to be welcomed.

Biblical journeys

I’ve been thinking about that journey in the context of Mary and Joseph’s journey to Bethlehem. They sought welcome and others gave them a stable. How from the stable, Mary and Joseph — and now Jesus — had to flee because if they stayed Herod would kill their son. How their flight meant that Herod killed other sons … and that at the end of the day it was Herod who bore the guilt. In the same way, our governments today enforce systems of all kinds that mean children — and other living things — die.

We went to the border to meet real human beings who had fled their homes in search of life.

But going to the border (and another family trip in the spring) meant that we used up our resources to go home for Christmas. I don’t just mean our financial resources, though we don’t have limitless money. I mean also that we used up our carbon emissions budget for the rest of the year.

Everything we do has a carbon footprint. In our household we’ve tried to make ours smaller by investing in the solar power option from our utility company, having one of our cars be hybrid (and driving our cars as little as possible), eating an all vegetarian diet (though my partner sometimes eats meat outside of our home), buying only what we need, investing our time and money into advocating for divestment from fossil fuels, and putting on a sweater when we’re cold instead of turning on the heat.

But every time we fly, we make that footprint larger. I fly often for work and I have had to face the guilt of the fact that every time I buy a plane ticket, I’m contributing to climate change. And climate change is literally killing other human beings right now. I don’t know how to stop flying for work — not yet — and it is the question I’m bringing into the New Year.

But knowing that — we need to make our own sacrifices.

Staying home

So on Christmas Eve, I’ll make a phone call home. I’ll laugh with my grandmother and listen to my niece sing to me over the phone. I’ll pick up cinnamon rolls made by my favorite local baker and snuggle up with my cats.

And as the night grows deeper, I’ll give thanks for the Little One who is coming into this world to love us and teach us and help us make home wherever we go.

abby mohaupt (name is correct as per the author) is the moderator of Fossil Free PCUSA, a doctoral student at Drew University in Madison, New Jersey, and a minister member of the Presbytery of San Francisco. She’s is a partner, daughter, aunt and sister, as well as a long-distance runner and artist.

 This piece was originally published Dec. 23, 2018, on Presbyterians Today’s blog.