Trip and Dreams of Ecological Civilization

My name is Rev. Bonnie Tarwater and I am the founder and minister of Church for Our Common Home, a nontraditional church and counseling center dedicated to the Earth, the Divine Feminine and the Arts. Dr. Zhihe Wang and Dr. Meijun Fan, the co-directors of the Post Modern Institute for the Development of China, have invited me to travel with them and Dr. John B. Cobb Jr. to China and Korea.
This promises to be a life transformative experience for me both professionally and personally. I will bring back ideas to contribute to the environmental movement and our church mission. The Institute for the Post Modern Development of China has generously offered to pay some of my expenses outside of travel costs while I am in China. I am raising funds for my air travel, other travel expenses and need your support to cover the estimated cost of $3,000.00.  No gift of support is too small.  We are leaving on September 16th and returning in October 2019.


In China, we will travel to four different provinces: Beijing in Hebei Province, Taigu in Shandong Province, Liandu in Zhejiang Province and Puer in southwest China on the Vietnam border in the Yunnan Province.   We will then travel to  Korea for the first Interfaith Ecologic Conference where Dr. Cobb will be the keynote speaker and I have been invited to present a paper. We will learn from religious leaders and scholars at the Interfaith Dialogue for a Sustainable Ecological Civilization eco-forum.  I will share how dream sharing invites us to become interfaith friends for it is an ancient spiritual practice whose time has come back! Church for Our Common Home offers an internet ministry that invites worship, educational programs and dream sharing in person as well as on the internet. This conference in Korea is particularly meaningful for me because I lived in Korea beginning when I was six years old and have not previously returned.   

Here is my passport photo when my family and I moved to Korea in 1962, 57 years ago. How much has changed in Korea since  I attended the first grade in Seoul?  Below is a photo of me on a medical tour of China in 1981 when I was 25 years old. How much have I changed in the last 60 years?  China, Korea and I have changed more than any of us could have imagined! Dr. Cobb is the preeminent interpreter of Alfred North Whitehead and process thought and theology and he teaches at the Claremont Institute for Process Studies, a process-relational worldview (e.g. the philosophical tradition of Alfred North Whitehead)–including the principles of interconnection, change, and intrinsic value–for advancing the common good.
 
The process God is one of creativity, transformative change, and love and s/he is calling us forward for the common good on this trip to China and Korea in hope that we can change the way we think and live in order to create an ecologic civilization. 

We also ask for your prayers for a safe and successful trip as well as prayers that I will be able to keep up with Dr. Cobb, who at 94 years old, has more energy and sense of life purpose and “Prana” than anyone I have ever known. He is a man on a mission to work to save the world. Being around him infects all of his students with inspiration, courage, and a deep desire to contribute to his vision of an “Ecologic Civilization.” This is a term used in the Chinese constitution and it turns out that China is way ahead of us here in the United States in naming and working on our global ecologic crisis. This is vastly underreported in our news here in the United States. Is this news to you?  Well, it has been a revelation to me, as well. What will be gained by your donation? You will receive:


- News from China and around the world that we can learn from which is not reported in our news media.  

- Strategies to create communities that support the health of the planet.

- New strategies being used in China and other countries to work to clean up the environment.

- Video and narrative notes for a project I will create about Dr. Cobb and ecologic civilization.

- New contacts and friendships to create an international community for our church and the environmental movement.

- Invitation to join needed global conversations about our successes and failures in the east and west and religious communities about our planetary crisis.

- New opportunities to join and support others who are creating ecologic civilization.

- Loving habits to learn to follow in Dr. Cobb’s footsteps.

- An invitation to a celebration sponsored by Church for Our Common Home and/or a report via the internet about the trip and interfaith ecology conference.

Here is a photo of the Institute for the Post Modern Development of China and Church for Our Common Home sponsoring a special Earth Day Program and dinner in 2019 hosting Dr. Oon, from Malaysia about her international work with Eco-Enzymes  and  the 2019 winner of the John Cobb Common Good Award, at Church for Our Common Home.  

Dr. Cobb, Dr. Wang and Dr. Fan have been instrumental in making this ecologic revolution a reality in China. It is urgent that we learn to live more ecologically and organically in order to change and survive as a human species.    Together this unlikely and amazing trio of Cobb, Wang and Fan have created 37  process centers at major universities in China, who in turn have helped to inspire emerging eco-villages, organic farming and other sustainability projects we need to learn about and emulate. I will bring back ideas to the United States,  locally to San Diego, to my denomination of the Unitarian Universalist Association and to our Church for Our Common Home.  It has not only the prophetic genius of Dr. Cobb as a teacher that has given me and millions of us a new ecologic vision to live by, it is because he practices what he preaches and is the best ambassador of Christianity of anyone I have ever known.   It is his radically loving natures that inspire me perhaps more than his prophetic genius.  

Fifty years ago, in 1969 space travelers went to the moon and brought back this photo of our common home- Mother Earth. That same year, Dr. Cobb had an awakening and wrote a book, Is It Too Late? A Theology of Ecology about our environmental crisis. He has led us as a prophet, philosopher, theologian, and environmentalist in his inspiring and tireless life’s work, not only telling the truth about the severity of our problem but offering a vision to save the world. So, is it too late to save ourselves from our global catastrophe?  I say NEVER! Why?  Because I am a grandmother with my third grandchild due to be born the first week of September and as Dr. Cobb says, “Where there is life there is hope.” We have no choice but to work to save the world’s future generations of human and non-human life.   I go on this trip to companion a planetary treasure and holy man, Dr. Cobb to China and Korea and will bring back his wisdom and stories of people from around the world working to save us from extinction. Please call me if you have any questions, ideas or special requests (858) [phone redacted].