The day is beckoning, the sun is shining, the rain has stopped, and many people are prepared for December shopping.
And the large garbage can in the mailroom of the building where I live is filled with Christmas catalogs and advertisements -bags of these unsolicited mailings go from mailbox to garbage can. Subscribing to or buying anything generates a flood of unsolicited newsletters and catalogs – companies seem to be begging for business, and, from looking at the garbage can, it’s apparent that this way is not working for either side. The question is how long will the waste continue? I bet the mail carriers would like to know.
* * * * * * *
. . .to use, to consume, has found its ultimate expression in our own times, when the ideal is to take the natural resources from the earth and transform them by industrial processes for consumption by a society that lives on ever-heightened rates of consumption. That consumption has something sacred about it is obvious from the central position it now occupies. This is all quite clear from the relentless advertising campaigns designed to convince society that there is neither peace nor joy, neither salvation nor paradise, except through heightened consumption. -Thomas Berry