Greenwashing sucks, yes, but in what ways are we ourselves complicit?

Interesting article in Fast Company by David Roberts.

Excerpt: 

The uncomfortable fact for many green marketers--and targets of that marketing--is that genuinely going green would mean giving up most of the products and services that clutter our consumer culture. It would mean simplifying, valuing time and people over stuff. How can most products avoid the sin of the hidden trade-off? With a simple label: "You don't really need this."  

Hear, hear.  I'm duly impressed.  We have met the enemy, as they say.  Here's the link to the full article, of which the above quote is just one of many gems:
http://www.fastcompany.com/magazine/123/another-inconvenient-truth.html 

The light of god inside

So I was listening to an interesting piece on NPR about some families of many different religions who are getting together to teach their children virtues (justice, service, patience, contentment, etc.).  And yes, there could be many potentially terrifying concepts about this (for example, um, obedience.)  But in general, okay, these people's hearts are in the right place.  

Anyway, one of the ideas was that the many different faiths are like different lampshades. The Jewish lampshade looks different from the Catholic one, the Baha'i one different from the Buddhist one... but they all have the light of god inside.  

I know plenty of my readers would search for a different word than god.  That aside, though, I love this thought.  It has a beauty that I admire.  And it may be an analogy I use to talk to my mom, in an effort to reassure her that the little girl she raised and loves with all her heart is really not going to go to hell, and that she does not need to worry.