Christian Ethics and Recycling & other Ecological Efforts

[danfreed]

I voted #7, although I am not there consistently. I'm sometimes in the wasteful sections, and occasionally diving in a dumpster (although less and less frequently in each decade)

Thanks for the encouragement Steve!

I understand from the Bible, that we are expected by God to be stewards of all the wonderful gifts He has given us.
This includes the great spiritual power/light (of the Message of Jesus the Savior)
as well as the fragile human bodies and other earthly resources in our control.

2 Cor 4:7 We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure.
This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.

[danfreed]

Thanks to Neto for the thread, and the others for your great comments!
(I first thought Steve was the thread owner, because I started with page 2)

[mike]

The only way I do recycling is if it pays money or saves money. Scrap metal and baled corrugated. The latter generally doesn't pay well enough to pay for maintenance on the baler, and basically is done to save the time of burning it or the cost of disposal. Everything else goes into the incinerator or garbage dumpster. In my municipality businesses have to record the tonnage of all recycling at the end of the year.

[MaxPC]

During the periods of rationing in WWII and after, we recycled some things as well as produced our own veg; and in the cases of a few fortunate families, they raised chickens and had milch cows. Otherwise we did without.

Clothing was patched or remade for smaller family members. Shoes were resoled with rubber bicycle tires that had worn out. Men and women who were handy with mechanics were able to re-work carburetors and other aspects of vehicles to keep them running. Even our late Queen worked repairs on vehicles in the military motor pool in her youth.

In my cultural perspective, hard times are opportunities to learn new skills and to grow in maturity. Another way that God blesses us if we are open to listening to Him.

[Neto]

During the periods of rationing in WWII and after, we recycled some things as well as produced our own veg; and in the cases of a few fortunate families, they raised chickens and had milch cows. Otherwise we did without.

Clothing was patched or remade for smaller family members. Shoes were resoled with rubber bicycle tires that had worn out. Men and women who were handy with mechanics were able to re-work carburetors and other aspects of vehicles to keep them running. Even our late Queen worked repairs on vehicles in the military motor pool in her youth.

In my cultural perspective, hard times are opportunities to learn new skills and to grow in maturity. Another way that God blesses us if we are open to listening to Him.

Back home in Oklahoma, in the 60's, there was a shop owner in our area whose business was to rewind motors. My parents had two things done that I remember specifically, the hair clippers, and Dad's circular saw.

There also used to be shoe repair shops all around, and Mom sewed shirts for us out of flour sacks. (Back then, they used print fabric for the flour sacks.)

Recently there was a guy here in Holmes County (and an "Englisher" at that) who organized and supervised a Fix-It group in Millersburg. People could bring by their own things to be fixed, or to donate for repair and resale in Good-Will or one of the other many second-hand stores in the area. The work was done by area volunteers, and for free. It was a way to help people, and also to keep usable appliances out of the dump.

[Last night I completed my latest "gambiarrista" project. The oil dip stick on my Dodge minivan broke off in the tube. The top part was made of plastic, and it snapped in-two at the weak spot, where the o-ring was located. I re-purposed the valve stem out of a bathroom faucet. Those are brass, so they can profitably be recycled, but I chucked it up in my drill, and did the "I-have-no-metal-lathe" turning method, working it into the required diameter with a file while the drill spins it. Used a couple of hack-saw blades side by side to get the right width groove for the o-ring.
Attached the metal part of the oil dip stick, and now I have a dip stick again, and it's stronger than the OEM one, too. (It took some time, more than it would take to just order another plastic one, which, incidentally, means you have to buy the whole thing - you cannot just buy the 89 cent plastic piece. But as I told the guys on the minivan site, I didn't want to just have it break off in there again in another 13 years....)]

[Neto]

I voted #7, although I am not there consistently. I'm sometimes in the wasteful sections, and occasionally diving in a dumpster (although less and less frequently in each decade)

I understand from the Bible, that we are expected by God to be stewards of all the wonderful gifts He has given us.
This includes the great spiritual power/light (of the Message of Jesus the Savior)
as well as the fragile human bodies and other earthly resources in our control.

2 Cor 4:7 We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure.
This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves.

Thanks for your added perspective - the need to be involved in the "recycling of the souls of men and women".

re: "dumpster-diving": I fashioned a "grappling stick" from an old mop handle. (Bent the metal bracket around a bit, and sharpened it into a point, so I can easily snag things w/o getting into the dumpster.) I have pulled out even working tools. A drill that just needed a new chuck. A tile breaker and a wet-type tile saw. Three infrared heaters. A milk-house heater, new in the box. (One fan blade was bent a bit, and it hit the frame, so the heater didn't run, for safety reasons. Bend the blade back in line, and walaa, a new heater.) Lots of other stuff over the years. One crazy story I'll tell on myself: Years ago, while home on furlough, we lived in an apartment just across the road from a dumpster. I would go out at night and check it out. Well, once when I was actually just walking past it, I saw a stuffed toy bunny. As I grabbed it I realized that it was attached to an Easter basket. I only wanted the stuffed toy, because we had small children. I tried to get it loose, but unbeknownst to me, the bunny was a "giggle-bunny'. Squeeze its tummy and it giggles. Well, not knowing about the giggling part, I was quite surprised. I think the bunny AND the basket are still connected, and still around here someplace, but its giggler ran out years ago.

[Ken]

Products change over time. For example, here is a page from a 1938 Sears Catalog where you can see that their basic 6 cf refrigerator cost $139.50. If you run that through an inflation calculator ( https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/) that same refrigerator would cost $3,008.92 today.



We can find an equivalent size basic top freezer fridge today at Home Depot for $269 which 11-times cheaper than the fridge in 1938 https://www.homedepot.com/p/Magic-Chef- ... /310700107?

Or we can spend $3000 and get an extravagant 27 cf side-by-side stainless steel fridge that far exceeds the capacity and efficiency of that $139.50 ColdSpot fridge from 1938. https://www.homedepot.com/p/GE-Profile- ... /311411352

Either way the cost savings and additional features between then and now come in the form of plastic parts and components. That's just the reality. We could still make tiny basic hand-crafted $3000 fridges today that are equally heavy duty, made from machined metal parts, and are repairable as those in 1938 but no one would ever want one.

[MaxPC]

Recently there was a guy here in Holmes County (and an "Englisher" at that) who organized and supervised a Fix-It group in Millersburg. People could bring by their own things to be fixed, or to donate for repair and resale in Good-Will or one of the other many second-hand stores in the area. The work was done by area volunteers, and for free. It was a way to help people, and also to keep usable appliances out of the dump.

This Fix-It Group is an outstanding idea. It would also be a stellar venue for spreading the Gospel and serving those in need while doing so. It could even have an adjunct that offers classes in repair skills for the younger generations.

[steve-in-kville]

The only way I do recycling is if it pays money or saves money. Scrap metal and baled corrugated. The latter generally doesn't pay well enough to pay for maintenance on the baler, and basically is done to save the time of burning it or the cost of disposal. Everything else goes into the incinerator or garbage dumpster. In my municipality businesses have to record the tonnage of all recycling at the end of the year.

My employer bales both cardboard and plastic, we have a dumpster just for scrap metal, and we have a paper shredder truck that comes around every few weeks.

At home, empty soda/seltzer cans are saved for back yard target practice with the airguns. Otherwise we burn our trash when we can and have curbside garbage pickup.

I have a substantial magazine collection that I want to recycle somehow but no one does that anymore in our area.

[Neto]

Products change over time. For example, here is a page from a 1938 Sears Catalog where you can see that their basic 6 cf refrigerator cost $139.50. If you run that through an inflation calculator ( https://www.usinflationcalculator.com/) that same refrigerator would cost $3,008.92 today.



We can find an equivalent size basic top freezer fridge today at Home Depot for $269 which 11-times cheaper than the fridge in 1938 https://www.homedepot.com/p/Magic-Chef- ... /310700107?

Or we can spend $3000 and get an extravagant 27 cf side-by-side stainless steel fridge that far exceeds the capacity and efficiency of that $139.50 ColdSpot fridge from 1938. https://www.homedepot.com/p/GE-Profile- ... /311411352

Either way the cost savings and additional features between then and now come in the form of plastic parts and components. That's just the reality. We could still make tiny basic hand-crafted $3000 fridges today that are equally heavy duty, made from machined metal parts, and are repairable as those in 1938 but no one would ever want one.

That was the market then, and I doubt if there was a model available for a fraction of that cost. Also, it was considered a luxury item for most country people, at least. (My paternal grandparents purchased the farm where my Dad grew up from the age of 7, in 1937 or 38. They didn't have electricity for a number of years after that, and that house NEVER had running water. We still called the refrigerator "ice box" growing up. I do get what you mean, and it's certainly true that many things are much cheaper now, in terms of hours worked to be able to make the purchase. The other side of that is that those appliances also lasted decades, much longer than the same type of thing now. But that isn't all the manufacturer's fault - the constant "need" to get the latest new design or color points to the consumer as at least part of the cause of the cheaply made goods we have to deal with now-a-days.