The following article appeared in Forum Letter, volume 46, number 5, May 2017. Forum Letter is a monthly publication of the American Lutheran Publicity Bureau.
Think Globally, Act Locally is a common and catchy bumper sticker slogan. David Brower, founder of Earth Day, allegedly coined the phrase in 1970 in support of various green efforts, so the bumper stickers typically express support for environmentalism. But the slogan readily adapts to any number of other causes, like world peace or economic justice. It is both powerful and versatile because it expresses a whole way of looking at one’s place in the world in a pithy, practical way.
To be sure, Act Locally doesn’t add much. After all, “locally” is, for all practical purposes, the only way we can act whether we’re thinking globally or not, especially when we think of what is “local” to a person to include physical proximity to them or close personal connection to them. Act Locally reminds us that dreaming big is not enough. We also have to act in our own sphere of influence, which is true but somewhat obvious. The real gist of the slogan, its revolutionary DNA—and the whole problem with it—is the directive Think Globally.
The problem with global thinking
Is globally really the best way to think? As a Christian I would say not, for reasons I’ll explain. True, we have to take the globe into account. We can’t dismiss with moral impunity the impact of our decisions on anyone, even if we’ll never meet them and even if that impact is very small. That much is common sense, and if Think Globally meant nothing more than “take the glove into account,” the slogan would not resonate. But it does resonate. The problem is that it resonates with
faulty assumptions about our place in the world.
The habit of thinking globally potentially (and subtly) changes our whole attitude and approach to the world. We become the planners. The slogan invites us to spread out an imaginary map and look at the world like gods on Mt. Olympus, almost as though we’re playing a board game. We consider the challenges of the board—too many people in China, not enough food in Ethiopia, rain forests disappearing in Brazil, patchy access to contraception in Africa, a lot of fat people driving SUVs in North America, most of the social map looking insufficiently like Scandinavia—and we then treat “our” (meaning earth’s and humanity’s) assets for tackling those challenges as pieces to be moved into stratetgic positions to solve those problems. With that map firmly in mind, we then find our own local place in the world, roll up our sleeves, and do whatever we can do within our own little sphere of influence to realize our global vision.
What’s my line?
My initial pushback to the directive Think Globally is to ask, “Is that really the job I’ve been assigned?” This question invites the counter-question: “Assigned by whom?” David Brower? Humanity? God? Aye, there’s the rub. Where is God in all this? Whose voice issues our vocations? Do we assign God a limited role in our grand plan or does God assign each of us a limited role in his grand plan? How is thinking globally different from thinking godlessly? If there is a god at all in the “think globally” mindset, it is the god of the pagan aphorism who “helps those who help themselves,” even when it comes to running the world (which is a tough job, but somebody has to do it). If we don’t think globally, who will?
Think Globally can thus function very much like a religion, giving people a place in the grand scheme of things, a spiritual mission, an eschatological goal, and a moral code for daily use. The global vision lends moral significance to small and seemingly irrelevant decisions like which coffee to drink (fair trade), which restaurants to patronize (locally owned, non-chain, organic), or which car to drive (electric). With a global vision of economic equality, world peace, and environmental restoration animating everything we do, we go about our day constantly choosing between good and evil, between giving a hoot and not giving a hoot, between being part of the problem or part of the solution. In short, we have a religion. But what god do we have? Who is in charge of the globe?
From the neck down
In any endeavor, the one in charge—the director of a movie or band, the coach of a football team, the manager of a construction crew, the general of an army, etc.—issues the vocations, so to speak, by assigning various roles to everyone involved and telling them how to fulfill them. When I’m helping my brother, who is a construction manager, with a project and I make some suggestion contrary to his directions, he’ll often retort, “We hired you from the neck down.” The point, of course, is to say, “You do the job I gave you, which is obviously more than enough for you to handle. I know how to fit that job into the grand scheme of things.” In other words, “Stop thinking globally and trust me.” And if the project is life and the one in charge is God, then trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding, especially not on your own or anyone else’s understanding of the entire world.
Leaving aside the big picture requires tremendous truat. Thinking strictly in terms of the task you’ve been assigned is an act of faith in the one handing out the assignments, be it the director, general, manager, or coach. Trusting a leader limits what we do and shapes how we do it. When we lack that trust we feel the need to start looking beyond those limits. If the coach cannot inspire confidence, if the general’s orders are illegal, well, then and only then do we question our assignments and take upon ourselves the job of evaluating the overall plan. In other words, when we lose faith in the one in charge we start to think globally, and rightfully so if our faith was unfounded. It all depends on whether the one we trust is trustworthy. Does a trustworthy voice issue our vocations? And I would say put not your trust in global thinkers, in mortal man who cannot save.
Consider your place
As a Christian I believe my vocations come fromGod. My catechism tells me, “consider your place in life according to the Ten Commandments.” But why should I do that any more than what a bumper sticker tells me to do? The catechism tells me why. It shows h
ow the Crreator who gave me my place in life and who wrote the Ten Commandments has also redeemed me. It thereby assures me that the One who gave me my assignment is absolutely trustworthy, that the assignment is more than enough for me, and that no matter what it may look like the world is in good hands. In bumper sticker format my catechism tells me Think Faithfully, Act Lovingly. Thinking faithfully includes trusting that God is thinking globally and knows what He is doing in assigning me my limited part. Acting lovingly means playing my part the way God wants it played.
Thinking globally does not always conflict with thinking faithfully. People thinking globally can still believe it important to honor their father and mother, and people thinking faithfully can still drink fair trade coffee while driving electric cars. But sometimes the differences between the two outlooks become stark. For example, to the Christian thinking faithfully, the value of a person, even an unborn child, is a given. God created this person and told us to love this person, and that is really as far as the reckoning need go. To the one thinking globally, however, the value of a person is a variable. An unborn child must still be justified amid considerations of its future carbon footprint, its likelihood of becoming a productive member of society, and its ability to bring joy and fulfillment to its mother. Superfluous, defective, or unwanted babies therefore have little value to the global thinker, and come at a high cost. But such babies have the same value as anyone else to the faithful thinker. Which way we think makes all the difference in the world, at least to someone.
Isn’t that immoral?
These two ways of thinking compete within individual minds. Years ago when a member of my church excitedly told her teenage daughter (who was also our babysitter) that my wife and I were expecting again, the young woman responded, “but isn’t that immoral?” Stunned, her mother asked where she had gotten that idea, and the girl responded that she had learned in high school that big families are bad for the environment. Simply considering the fact of a human being, this young woman was torn between the way she had been taught to think by her family and her church (faithfully) and the way she had been taught to think by her school and popular cultgure (globally). Whether she should affirm or condemn our bringing a new person into the world hung in the balance. Before making yourself a eunuch for the sake of the kingdom, make sure you’re clear on who is the king.
As with the environment, so with the economy. Perhaps the greatest sin Jesus of Nazareth ever committed in the eyes of secularists was his offhand comment that the poor we would always have with us. To the one thinking globally that casual aside amounts to a proclamation of despair. According to Jesus we’re never going to win the board game that is the map of the world by eliminating poverty. But to the one thinking faithfully and acting lovingly it amounts to nothing more than an observation that our calling toward our neighbor will never change. Our neighbor is not our problem to solve but the person we are to love. Visit the lonely. Comfort the grieving. Help the needy. “Trust me,” God says, “to deal with grief and suffering on a global scale. I’m on it. You love your neighbor.”
Your neighbor is the whole world
At the end of Schindler’s List, the Jews Oskar Schindler saved give him a ring engraved with the proverb, “Whoever saves one life saves the world entire.” Schindler did not set out to save the world entire. He was not thinking globally. He (eventually) treated the people in front of him as God would have neighbors treated, and in so doing he discovered that he had inadvertently saved the world, and done so hundreds of times over. The secret of his story is that to act lovingly is to act globally because your neighbor is the whole world. Think faithfully. Act lovingly. This is the whole duty of man.
— by Peter Speckhard, associate editor