The time is now for faith communities to come together to address the moral urgency of plastic pollution. Humanity has exceeded a tipping point in the production of plastics, and production continues to skyrocket at an alarming rate. Micro- and nanoparticles from plastic waste have now been found everywhere from the Mariana Trench to Mount Everest. Indeed, there is nowhere on Earth to escape the presence of toxic plastic pollution.
People of faith all over the world proclaim that the human condition is characterized by interconnection. Some have called this inter-being or kinship, not only with one another but all beings both sentient and non-sentient. We are in relationship to the Earth through all that is necessary to sustain life: our food and the agricultural soils that grow it, the air we breathe, and the water we drink. But the presence of microplastics contaminating all of these and ultimately lodging themselves in the human body — from our hearts, lungs, brains, and liver to the placenta, breast milk, and even newborn babies — illustrates in the most tangible way possible what Chief Seattle so prophetically warned, that “what we do to our earth, we do to ourselves.”
Many faiths testify to this truth. Perhaps the Zulu word ubuntu best describes how humanity is inherently interlinked in a universal bond. In the creation story of Genesis 2 shared by both Christians and Jews around the world, the Creator lovingly forms the human — adam — from the soil of the earth, adamah. The ancient Hebrew language illustrates the understanding of the inherent relationship between humanity and the Earth, that humans are part of our environment. The Buddhist concept of pratītyasamutpāda, or dependent origination, describes how all things arise in mutual dependence. In the Quran, the Surah Al-Baqarah (verse 30) illuminates the commandment to care for the planet precisely because human well-being is intrinsically linked to the health of the environment. Furthermore, many faiths profess that a divine spark animates and radiates through every living being on this planet. For all living beings — from soil to sea — to now be polluted by the presence of wholly synthetic and toxic microplastics embedded in their bodies is to mar the very face of God.
Our current moment in the plastic pollution crisis demands that humanity rekindle its sacred siblinghood with all Creation from which we arose. The conception of each individual as an island, as a master of their own domain and destiny must be called out as a fallacy that fails to acknowledge our dependence upon the Earth, our bonds with the human family, and our relationship to the Creator of all. Seeing ourselves as separate and other from nature is the intellectual source of our alienation from creation. It is the mother of false dichotomies like spirit and matter, heaven and earth, mind and body. These translate into dualisms with implicit hierarchies of human privileged over nature, man over woman, white over Black that are responsible for not only ecological destruction but also patriarchy, colonialism, and white supremacy.
The waste that results from human consumption is a physical manifestation of these power relations within the “inescapable network of mutuality,” described by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., as plastic pollution disproportionately affects marginalized and vulnerable communities domestically and around the globe. Communities in developing nations are plagued by rivers and beaches filled by plastic waste. Incinerator ash and disposable plastic packaging is even dumped into the ocean intentionally. Children in countries affected by waste exports should not have to spend their days sorting through plastics to earn pennies for their families. In these places around the globe, the incineration of plastics both in households as a cheap source of fuel or at the industrial level, emits volatile organic compounds and toxins, causing serious health concerns. Indeed, it is time to raise up that there is no just final destination for a product that was born from the extraction of fossil fuels, and refined and produced in facilities that bring disease, destruction, and death to the communities in which they are situated.
In the words of the Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh, “We are here to awaken to the illusion of our separateness.” We belong to the earth, to the very soil beneath our feet. We belong to each other. We belong to the divine. What happens to one, happens to all. Our spiritual longing is to return to one another and live in such a way that honors kinship as the true nature of our being. We can no longer live at the expense and demise of our planet and siblings in the human family.
We the undersigned, as people of faith and conscience, are pleading as our earth cries out. If we wish to leave a habitable planet for our children and our children’s children, a Global Plastics Treaty must prioritize human health, safeguard the environment, and advance human rights. This Treaty must:
1. Set mandatory, legally binding limits on production of new plastic, especially single-use plastics, with targets and timetables.
2. Establish strict regulation of the thousands of chemicals in plastics, which include known human carcinogens, neurotoxicants, endocrine-disrupting chemicals, and hundreds more that have never been tested for toxicity.
3. Be guided by an International Science Advisory Panel independent of the plastics Industry.
There is too much at stake and no time to wait.
