Dirty Carrots and the Kingdom of Heaven

Carrots, which do you buy? I’d like to suggest that it is the ‘dirty carrots’ that can help to bring closer the kingdom of God. Today is Creation Sunday, and tomorrow begins Fairtrade Fortnight. It seems an appropriate time therefore to dwell on our relationship with the earth and all that we consume from it. We are children of the dust. Whether a person of faith, religion or no defined structure of belief it is not possible to escape the simple truth that we as humans are children of the dust. Just as any other carbon life on this planet we owe our existence to the earth, soil, dirt. Perhaps it is ironic then that our natural disposition appears to be away from the earth, to view the earth, soil, dirt as dirty and contaminating. Mechanisation brings many benefits, but at the cost of putting distance between us and the earth. We begin to loose our attachment to the very thing that brought us into being and sustains us.

Watching my children grow over the past 15 years it is clear that the tendency is to grow slowly apart from those who nurture and give life. In the best of families these ties remain into adulthood and though independent there remains a strong parent child relationship. Eventually those relationships are turned upon their head and the child nurtures and cares for the parent into old age and finally towards death. Such is the cycle of life. As children of the dust we as humanity perhaps naturally draw away from that which has given us life. Dreams of the stars and life on different planets. Dreams of becoming independent from the earth itself. The knowledge, whether acknowledged or not, that without checking ourselves we will destroy the capacity of this fragile planet to continue to provide for us as has been out wont. The word fragile is a misnomer. The earth itself is not fragile per se, it is a complex interweaving of life and relationship built for continued life. It is the intervention of humans that makes it appear fragile to our way of existence. With this relationship to our planet we grow yet further away from mother earth.

Relationship is the key word. A healthy relationship is one in which there is movement in both directions. The giving and receiving are equal. Relationships that have broken down are those where only one is giving and the other is always receiving. Relationships like these can indicate slavery of some kind or other. Until not so long ago it was hard to know who was being exploited with what and by whom. The fairtrade movement changed all that! It is now easy to see which products are produced with good relationships between growers and producers and consumers. Products that are not marked as fairtrade may well be made and grown in a slavery free environment, but the fairtrade mark guarantees that they are not. It is more than a mark of a good trade deal, it ensures that no-one is exploited along the way. The first cups of fairtrade coffee were marketed by oxfam under the campaign label. It was ground instant, and it was terrible. However, when people tell me now that they ‘don’t like’ fairtrade coffee, and I would have sympathised in the 80’s, – I wouldn’t suggest this now – there are over 23 companies selling at least one fairtrade coffee and many of them such as cafedirect have about 15 different coffee’s available, so the question is – which fairtrade coffee is it that you don’t like. I would suggest that initially people just don’t like being told what to buy, but if slavery is your thing, then who am I to stop you?

I guess the issue is that we are removed from the pain, and it is just another product on a supermarket shelf like any other. The beauty of FT is that it closes up the gap between producer and consumer. FT products are fully traceable – we all know where a lack of traceability leads to in foods. The relationship between ourselves and the earth with Fairtrade products becomes a little closer. I guess its a bit like buying carrots. You can buy washed, sanitised, diced, sliced, chopped and bagged carrots if you so choose, and i’m sure they are perfectly good carrots, but you can also buy ‘dirty carrots’. The cleansed ones work just the same, but all that is needed is to open the bag and throw them in the pan. The dirty ones take a little more effort. The soil has to be cleaned off, then peeling, washing, topping and tailing. In those simple actions, we have become closer to the source of our food and actually touched the earth they grew in and also become closer to the person who watched over them whilst they grew and pulled them out of the ground. We give a little back in recognising the grower in these actions. It is the same as choosing Fairtrade – choosing to close the loop a little between ourselves and the earth can be no bad thing. Jesus says do not worry about what you eat – so long as you seek the kingdom in all things, and as the kingdom is about our relationship with each other and this earth, dirty carrots really can bring the kingdom of God a little closer.