World Alliance of Reformed Churches, World Council of Churches, Council for World Mission

COLLOQUIUM AND OIKOTREE LAUNCH EVENT

2008 DECEMBER 11-16 | MANILA, PHILIPPINES

CLOSING MESSAGE

“Move towards Life-Giving Oikos”

By PARK SEONG-WON

2008 DECEMBER 16

What time is it now? Is it 16:30? (The closing session of the Oikotree Colloquium began at 16:30.) That’s our time. But the ecological time is 23:55. The ecological time warns that only five minutes are left before this beautiful planet earth comes to its end. This is the timeframe, the kairotic time when our Oikos movement is about to be launched.

Where are we now in terms of the fate of planet earth? According to Contra-Genesis, a parody poem written by an anonymous person from Nicaragua about human destruction of creation, today is the second day before all will end. If I quote the whole text of that part of Contra-Genesis, it reads as follows:

Finally man said, ‘Let us make God in our image and likeness,

so no other God will arise to compete with us.

Let us say that God thinks as we think, hates as we hate,

and kills as we kill.’

It was the second day before all ended.

This is the kind of spirituality we have in this time of human history. This is the time, and space and the situation in which we launch the Oikotree movement. This time and space, and this situation are not normal. It is a kairotic time and a kairotic situation of our history.

At the General Council of the World Alliance of Reformed Churches in 2004 when the famous Accra Confession was declared, we heard that within 50 years, 25% of animal and plant species will vanish due to global warming. But this prediction is already out of date.

The International Panel on Climate Change report released earlier this year says that, the percentage of vanished species is 30%, not 25%, and the deadline is within 30 years time, not 50 years. Dr. Clara Deser, senior scientist of the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in USA, said in her interview with a Korean paper on 3 March 2008 that the global warming process is advancing 10 or 20 years faster than expected. The portion of the glacier in the Polar Regions that melted down last year, 2007, was what had expected to happen 10 or 20 years later. The process of ecological destruction is much faster, much sooner and much stronger than we imagine.

Alan Durning pointed out that the global consumer classes produced and consumed as many goods and services in the half century from 1950 to 2000, as throughout the entire period of history prior to 1950. In the U.S., since the start of a recession in late 2007 almost 2 million people lost their jobs. Two-thirds of these losses occurred since last September and there are forecasts for more. In contrast, just last year and amid worsening economic conditions, U.S. CEOs were paid 344 times the pay of a typical worker. The top 50 hedge and private equity fund managers earned more than 19 thousand times more than the average U.S. worker. The neoliberal economic globalization time is also 23:55.

This is the time and situation in which we are now about to launch the Oikotree movement. We have no time to do more research, no time for more debate and no time to gather information and no time to draft a report. Only five minutes are left before all end. Unless we move right now, we cannot guarantee whether our children will really be given a space and time to survive, no, our very own survival is at stake.

Over the last several hundreds of years we thought that industrialization, urbanization and modernization are the best ways for human development. We admit that these processes have brought us some good things, such as a convenient life. But today we see that our life, not only our life, but also the life of the whole living beings are threatened by these processes.

A warning forecast before the last day by the Nicaraguan poet describes the picture of the last day as follows:

On the last day a great blast shook the face of the Earth;

Fire purged that beautiful terrestrial ball, and all was silent.

And the Lord God saw what man had done.

And in the silence that engulfed the smoking ruins, God wept.

It is in this context in which we are now launching the Oikotree movement.

Do we have hope? Do we dare to hope? Where is the source of hope?

Oikos is the place and the house where the incarnated God dwells with us. God is still working to produce life even in the sandbar where human beings blocked the life of all living beings. If this prodigal world turns its way back to God’s Oikos, the nature in which the incarnated God dwells with us and works with us, we still have hope. A crucial question is whether we are ready to work with God.

By launching the Oikotree movement today, 15 Dec. we are ready and are committing ourselves to work with God for transforming life-killing civilization into life-giving Oikos. As the prodigal son discovered plenty of food when he returned to his father’s home, this prodigal human civilization will find the abundant life if we return to God’s life-giving Oikos now. Let us respond to the invitation of God.

Let me conclude by sharing with you God’s Word which I keep all the time in my mind whenever I am engaged in the struggle for justice. That is Galatians 6.9. “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.” Our journey is an eschatological journey and we are eschatological people who hope against hope. If we do not become weary in struggling for justice, and if we do not give up, someday, we will reap a harvest of justice and joy.

Dr. Park Seong-Won is Professor of Theology at Youngnam Theological University, South Korea