Recycle ♻️ Regifting the Earth
1943 War Effort. Still relevant today in efforts to respect our shared Home! Photo posted in my complex’s lobby.
In the spirit of Recycle, Repurpose, & Regift, Richard Rohr in his daily meditations, quotes Potawatomi botanist and author Robin Wall Kimmerer [who] critiques our obsession with economic growth:
“The threat of real scarcity on the horizon is brought to us by unbridled capitalism. Extraction and consumption outstrip the capacity of the Earth to replenish what we have taken. An economy based on the impossibility of ever expanding growth leads us into nightmare scenarios. I cringe when I hear economic reports celebrating the accelerating pace of economic growth, as if that were a good thing. It might be good for [some in power], for the short term, but it is a dead end for others—it is an engine of extinction.”
Kimmerer learns about the benefits of a “gift economy” from a local farmer and businesswoman who occasionally offers surplus Serviceberries to her neighbors for free.
Paulie has a reputation to uphold for being no-nonsense in her approach to life …:
“It’s not really altruism,” she insists. “An investment in community always comes back to you in some way. Maybe people who come for Serviceberries will come back for Sunflowers and then for the Blueberries. Sure, it’s a gift, but it’s also good marketing. The gift builds relationships, and that’s always a good thing….” The currency of relationship can manifest itself as money down the road, because Paulie and Ed do have to pay the bills….
“Even when something is paid for as a commodity, the gift of relationship is still attached to it. The ongoing reciprocity in gifting stretches beyond the next customer, though, into a whole web of relations that are not transactional. Paulie and Ed are banking goodwill, so-called social capital….
“I cherish the notion of the gift economy, that we might back away from the grinding system, which reduces everything to a commodity and leaves most of us bereft of what we really want: a sense of belonging and relationship and purpose and beauty, which can never be commoditized. I want to be part of a system in which wealth means having enough to share, and where the gratification of meeting your family needs is not poisoned by destroying that possibility for someone else. I want to live in a society where the currency of exchange is gratitude and the infinitely renewable resource of kindness, which multiplies every time it is shared rather than depreciating with use….
“I don’t think market capitalism is going to vanish; the faceless institutions that benefit from it are too entrenched. The thieves are very powerful. But I don’t think it’s pie in the sky to imagine that we can create incentives to nurture a gift economy that runs right alongside the market economy. After all, what we crave is not trickle-down, faceless profits, but reciprocal, face-to-face relationships, which are naturally abundant but made scarce by the anonymity of large-scale economics. We have the power to change that, to develop the local, reciprocal economies that serve community rather than undermine it.”
Quoted in Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditations,
Center for Action and Contemplation, October 9, 2025.
Recycle ♻️ Regifting the Earth
1943 War Effort. Still relevant today in efforts to respect our shared Home! Photo posted in my complex’s lobby.
In the spirit of Recycle, Repurpose, & Regift, Richard Rohr in his daily meditations, quotes Potawatomi botanist and author Robin Wall Kimmerer [who] critiques our obsession with economic growth:
“The threat of real scarcity on the horizon is brought to us by unbridled capitalism. Extraction and consumption outstrip the capacity of the Earth to replenish what we have taken. An economy based on the impossibility of ever expanding growth leads us into nightmare scenarios. I cringe when I hear economic reports celebrating the accelerating pace of economic growth, as if that were a good thing. It might be good for [some in power], for the short term, but it is a dead end for others—it is an engine of extinction.”
Kimmerer learns about the benefits of a “gift economy” from a local farmer and businesswoman who occasionally offers surplus Serviceberries to her neighbors for free.
Paulie has a reputation to uphold for being no-nonsense in her approach to life …:
“It’s not really altruism,” she insists. “An investment in community always comes back to you in some way. Maybe people who come for Serviceberries will come back for Sunflowers and then for the Blueberries. Sure, it’s a gift, but it’s also good marketing. The gift builds relationships, and that’s always a good thing….” The currency of relationship can manifest itself as money down the road, because Paulie and Ed do have to pay the bills….
“Even when something is paid for as a commodity, the gift of relationship is still attached to it. The ongoing reciprocity in gifting stretches beyond the next customer, though, into a whole web of relations that are not transactional. Paulie and Ed are banking goodwill, so-called social capital….
“I cherish the notion of the gift economy, that we might back away from the grinding system, which reduces everything to a commodity and leaves most of us bereft of what we really want: a sense of belonging and relationship and purpose and beauty, which can never be commoditized. I want to be part of a system in which wealth means having enough to share, and where the gratification of meeting your family needs is not poisoned by destroying that possibility for someone else. I want to live in a society where the currency of exchange is gratitude and the infinitely renewable resource of kindness, which multiplies every time it is shared rather than depreciating with use….
“I don’t think market capitalism is going to vanish; the faceless institutions that benefit from it are too entrenched. The thieves are very powerful. But I don’t think it’s pie in the sky to imagine that we can create incentives to nurture a gift economy that runs right alongside the market economy. After all, what we crave is not trickle-down, faceless profits, but reciprocal, face-to-face relationships, which are naturally abundant but made scarce by the anonymity of large-scale economics. We have the power to change that, to develop the local, reciprocal economies that serve community rather than undermine it.”
Quoted in Richard Rohr’s Daily Meditations,
Center for Action and Contemplation, October 9, 2025.