Land and Envorinmentla Rights

For many, environmental issues seem to be the enemy, though I understand why one thinks that, but it is also complicated depending on politics and many factors. I grew up, environmentalism was the enemy of farmers, or so it seems. I have been trying to think about how to explain what goes on in many countries, and specifically in Honduras in a way that would make sense to me when I was a young boy in Shickley, Nebraska, a farm boy.

I think I would tell myself to imagine this scenario:

Imagine the farms you have had for generations in the peaceful community. Your families are intact, you celebrate the seasons, the community is whole. Slowly, or suddenly, big co-corporations and rich landowners begin buying the land upstream from your farms and taking all the water from the irrigation ditches, leaving only harmful chemicals down-stream. If you are in a forested area (Nebraska is not), imagine all the trees cut down, the roots that hold the soil taken away, the soil erodes, the water runs downstream instead of sinking into the ecosystem. All the while this is going on, the government is receiving payments from these corporations and people and looking the other way. They never asked your permission. Imagine this being supported by governments in foreign lands leaving you powerless to protect your own land. Imagine it turning worse, the government starts selling your land to those corporations and rich land-owners. They say they are improving the community and making the country modern. They say it is good for business and the economy. You begin to be frustrated. You raise your voice, that the land is being destroyed, you can't grow crops, you can’t feed your family, people begin to distrust each other,  and the community is broken. Your land is being taken away…………………………………….. Imagine that their response is to kill you.



What if by writing this, I am killed.



This is the reality for many in Honduran farmers. This is a root of migration. Farmers uprooted, leaving to the city, to the shantytowns. In the shantytowns they are murdered by gangs. Their wives and children leave to the U.S. and Canada, hoping for relief and compassion. They are turned away, returned, murdered in their own country. What if it happened in our land? If it happened to us, to our land, to our food, trees, water? Do we feel the pain of others?

Jesus asks this question in the parable of the good Samaritan. How far does our love go for us? How far will we go for others? This thought scares me, challenges me. God give me grace.