Choosing Simplicity Over Conspicuous Consumption

There may not be a better place than Las Vegas for a thoughtful examination of responsible consumption. The city's neon-lit gambling strip never closes. The city itself, in the middle of a desert, depends on water and power from the dammed-up Colorado River. The area's rapid growth is threatening desert wildlife. When the local newspaper set out recently to find religious groups involved in environmental issues, it came up empty-handed--except for one.

"They kept striking out until they reached us," says the Rev. Gail Collins-Ranadive, interim minister at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Las Vegas. She was able to tell the reporter that, yes, UUs did care about the environment, that their respect for earth-centered traditions leads them to believe in living responsibly upon the earth, and that many UUs look to nature for first-hand experience of the sacred.

She could also tell the reporter about the 100-member congregation's seminarium program, designed to help participants decide what was important in their lives, then decide how they want to live given the realities of the earth. Further, she told the newspaper, "We're going to explore simple living and how one does that in Las Vegas, where over-consumption and conspicuous consumption are all around us."

The congregation began the program in preparation for calling its first-ever settled minister. It was a matter of serendipity that at General Assembly 1999 in Salt Lake City, delegates selected responsible consumption as a study/action issue and urged congregations to study and act on it in their own communities.

Responsible consumption and sustainable living present a large opportunity, the Unitarian Universalist Association's Commission on Social Witness said in its GA presentation: The United States and Canada are among the most materially wasteful societies in the world--for example, the U.S. is home to 5% of the world's population but is responsible for 40% of global resources consumed.

Since 1999, and earlier in many cases, North American congregations have been studying this issue and putting what they've learned into action. In Las Vegas, the seminarium program, the newspaper article, and the UUA initiative have inspired the congregation, Collins-Ranadive says.

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