A spirit-liftingly beautiful morning again and a very fine 25 minute run spent reflecting on food, warmth, and the Bible.
Compared to the starvation faced by millions of people in the Horn of Africa just now, the issue of whether people in northern Europe can afford to keep their homes at a healthy temperature is a relative luxury. Nevertheless, as the biggest UK energy provider, British Gas, announce an increase in annual profit of 50% and an increase in price of 18% (ref), it again begs the question of why something as fundamental, and finite, as fossil fuels should be in the hands of private corporations rather than properly controlled by the State, and why we sit paralysed like rabbits in the headlights allowing it to happen.
Discussion of profiteering and apathy leads neatly to the Bible. I should declare at this point that I am a committed atheist but not averse to finding good sense in the scriptures of any religion. Yesterday I referred to the Hindu exhortation to make only modest and unexploitative demands on the world's resources. Today I remembered the beatitude from the New Testament gospels, "... the meek shall inherit the earth". Now, Jesus probably wasn't referring to woodlice at the time but, given that humans still haven't learned the lesson 2000 years later, there is a strong case for reinterpretation.
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