Last year, I attended a meditation conference in Vancouver with a prominent international organization. The event featured an important teacher of Christian contemplative spirituality who spends much of his time travelling and teaching. I wrote much of this reflection the day after the conference and then decided not to post it. But I want to publish it now that some time has past because I think the distinctions I make are still relevant to our unfolding meta-crisis.

After my talk I was on a panel. An elderly woman stood and in her shaky voice said that she wants to know what we can do about climate change. And that for her, at her age, the best thing she could think to do is pray and meditate. I empathized with her desire to know what we can do, and I tried to assuage her guilt a little for not being able to do more. This was a meditation conference after all. So, I said, its not as though meditation is a tool in our climate action toolbox and that we should walk away from a conference on meditation with a list of five things you can do to solve the climate crisis.

The figurehead of the conference, who was also on the panel followed up in his characteristically blunt, didactic tone. Despite what I thought was a realistic and contemplative response, he took me to task for suggesting that there was nothing we could do (I did not say that). He suggested that while we shouldn’t instrumentalize meditation, it should always lead to action; and that there are plenty of things we can do to take meaningful action to solve the climate crisis.

At the end of the conference, the local organizer (who works in corporate finance) asked us to get into small groups and literally make a list of things we could do to combat climate change. This felt like a direct jab at my panel contribution, and at that point I could not stay in the room or join a small group. So, I stood up and left.

I admit this was not the most mature thing to do. But I also think that the gesture expressed without words how I feel about the risk they were taking in packaging the purpose of contemplative practices as useful action. So let me defend my one man walk out.

There is a controversy that goes all the way back to the Greeks between contemplation and action. Should the good life be devoted to higher things of the mind or the worldly things of politics and society? The Benedictine monks I have worked with say, do both! Their motto is Ora et Labora, Work and Prayer. But notice that the motto is not Work is Prayer. Work and prayer both have their place in the monastic life, as do contemplative and active pursuits outside of the monastery. But in relation to climate change, there is an important space to keep between these two domains.

Because here is where we are: avoiding 1.5- and even 2-degree warming targets are likely unattainable at current rates of emissions and international commitments. So, when we talk about “taking action” on climate, we are not talking about little things that will contribute to a gradual cultural shift. We are not talking about our individual actions adding up to dodging the worst implications of two degrees warming. We are talking about urgent, massive internationally coordinated efforts to radically reduce carbon emissions, and, at this point, because we have no other option, to pull carbon out of the atmosphere because if we don’t, we are looking at three or four degrees warming by the end of the century. That is where we are.

So, I agree, we should never stop asking the question “What must I do?” We are living out the risks of not being able to answer this question. My lifetime may never fully answer this question. I want to keep asking it. But when it comes to climate change, I just do not know of an answer that can be packaged into a pithy hope-slogan or a list of actions. There are dozens of things we can do with our days. And I have too long lists of them. But there is no thing that we can do individually, municipally, provincially or even nationally that will swallow this meta-crisis whole.

And that is where meditation resides. It lives in the dark folds of my still hopeful heart. Contemplative Practice is not a tool to get us ready for the right action. It is not just one of our strategies for effective climate action. It is not just a practice of self-care to process our burn out from our at-least-we-are doing-something actions. It is not just a means to an end. Contemplative practices are the ground of our action. They are the soil out of which right action grows and the air our actions breath. I engage in contemplative practices whether our actions succeed or fail, whether I know what to do or not. I meditate as I wait for the answers to come, or not.