{"id":21740,"date":"2019-02-21T21:48:41","date_gmt":"2019-02-22T05:48:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=21740"},"modified":"2019-02-21T21:48:41","modified_gmt":"2019-02-22T05:48:41","slug":"looking-for-leaves","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/looking-for-leaves\/","title":{"rendered":"Looking for Leaves"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>We have a nest in our house. Not the kind that birds have, but the thermostat kind. We got it when we moved into this house a little over 4 years ago. What\u2019s cool about a nest thermostat is that you can be wise with your energy consumption, and you get this little green leaf. When you use energy at off-peek times \u2013 green leaf. When you use less than your neighbors \u2013 green leaf. We got the nest as a way to be more conscientious of our energy consumption, because as an American living in what is an actual desert, we use a lot. Every time I see the leaf, I am proud of how much energy we\u2019ve saved.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

As I am sitting here, drinking warm tea in my centrally-heated house with my little green leaf, the dishwasher running, and Consuming Religion: Christian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture<\/em> in my hand, I realize just how much of the American dream I am living in. I had no idea that because I have central heating, and not a hearth to warm my family, I was playing right into the hand of the modern nuclear family.[1]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

In his work, Miller seeks to explore consumer culture changes our relationship with ones own religious beliefs, narratives, and symbols.[2]<\/a> Essentially, Miller posits that the consumer mentality is so pervasive in Western culture, that we (since I am an American) approach religion as just one more product to consume.[3]<\/a> Miller points to a significant number of experiences which have led Westerners to view religion as a consumable item, but few are as significant as the shift in marketing to include more illustrations, not just text.[4]<\/a> Miller goes on to argue that these marketing ploys lead to the viewing of religious symbols and artifacts as consumable items, which results in religious practices and beliefs that function as just products, not significant pieces of tradition.[5]<\/a><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\u201cAlthough the world has plenty of selfish narcissists, the real problem with consumer culture lies in the structures and practices that systematically confuse and misdirect well-intentioned people seeking to do good things such as show solidarity with others, find spiritual transformation, and practice their sincerely held religious beliefs.\u201d[6]<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

Tonight, I was at work and I overheard a student who had just been awakened to the idea of fast fashion. She watched a Netflix documentary and was \u201cruined\u201d because of having her eyes opened to the cost of consumption. My husband, who happened to be with me, smirked at me, because I have been \u201cruined\u201d because of fast fashion for a long time. I looked at him and with a kind of sad realization said, \u201cI can\u2019t be the expert on everything.\u201d What I meant by that was that I could have sat down and given that student some resources, some clothing companies to research, some things to chew on, but I am so busy trying to hold other things, and \u201clive differently\u201d I just can\u2019t help someone else right now.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Honestly, I don\u2019t know how I feel about this book. On the one hand, I enjoyed it because it definitely made me think deeply about the role of work, and my own personal consumption. But if I\u2019m being vulnerable, I just feel like I can\u2019t be told I\u2019m failing at one more thing. To read that I am not a narcissist, but that I am constantly being misdirected really makes me want to just give up. I want to throw in the towel. I don\u2019t want to read one more thing that points to my own failures and the grand sweeping failure of humanity and our economic religious practices. I just want to see the little green leaf. I know I am doing everything I can to be conscientious of my lifestyle, and I also recognize my privilege as a white American female with a two income, single family home with a central heating system. I do. But how many times am I going to be told that I am part of a failed system that puts me, a Protestant Christian, at the heart of a jacked-up economy that no one can escape from?<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

My house is cold because my heat cycled off. My tea is cold because I\u2019ve spent too much time typing and not drinking it. My hearts a little cold because I\u2019m hurting. I\u2019m hurting for a culture I so desperately want to fix, and feel called to fix. I\u2019m just looking for the little green leaves showing me I\u2019m on the right track. Will you join me, neighbor?<\/p>\n

_______________________________________________________<\/p>\n

[1]<\/a> Vincent J. Miller, Consuming Religion: Christian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture <\/em>(New York, NY: The Continuum International Publishing Group, 2005), 47.<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a> Ibid., 3<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a> Phyllis Zagano, \u201cConsuming Religion: Christian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture Review,\u201d Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality 5, no. 1 (2005): 119-122<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a> Ibid., 119<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a> Courtney Wilder, “Vincent J Miller,\u00a0Consuming Religion: Christian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture<\/em>,” The Journal of Religion 85, no. 4 (October 2005): 681-682.<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a> Vincent J. Miller, Consuming Religion: Christian Faith and Practice in a Consumer Culture <\/em>(New York, NY: The Continuum International Publishing Group, 2005), 225.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We have a nest in our house. Not the kind that birds have, but the thermostat kind. We got it when we moved into this house a little over 4 years ago. What\u2019s cool about a nest thermostat is that you can be wise with your energy consumption, and you get this little green leaf. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":121,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[834,371,255,1460],"class_list":["post-21740","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-consumer-religion","tag-consumerism","tag-miller","tag-nest","cohort-lgp9"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21740","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/121"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21740"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21740\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21744,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21740\/revisions\/21744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21740"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21740"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21740"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}