29 April

This Morning, I Honor The Climate Kids, On The March

by Jon Katz
The Climate Kids

This morning, I honor the Climate Kids, 21 young people marching in Washington today on behalf of Mother Earth, our bleeding and troubled home. They are an inspiration to me, they are suing the federal government for its inaction on climate change, on behalf of their own future and that of their children.

They’ve come a long way to speak for us, for the animals, for the earth.

A selfless and noble thing for kids to be doing in the age of Facebook and Twitter. They are not arguing their beliefs, they are living them, doing good. They feel for the displaced animals, the rising waters, the awful fires and storms. They are insisting that their government represent them and help to save the earth.

I am not here to argue climate change. I think any honest person who looks out the window or walks into nature can see climate change every day, right under our noses. On the farm, we feel it every day – warmer days, drier soul, failing wells, costlier hay, drought and the gradual loss of our winters.

The geese no longer bother to fly south for the winter, they are warm enough right here.

I am thinking of these kids today, in our country, where greed is God, we talk (or used to) of the need to erase the deficit so our children will not bear our burdens. Yet we look away as the ice caps melt, and the earth warms, and cities flood and drought spreads and storms rage.

I don’t wish for my granddaughter to bear that burden.

Today, my heroes are these children, people of conscience and principle and vision. And Pope Francis, who calls upon all of us to tend to our universal mother, the earth. I will nod my heads to them today, and wish them well on their march to the White House.

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