Native Calendars, and Climate Change as Catalyst

Some catalysts (including bacteria and yeast) have both good and bad effects.

In church speak, “inspiration” applies to what a catalyst does, and “transformation” applies to the change that an inspiration sparks. Daily we live around catalysts/inspirations, for example, a story, a text, a teaching, a person, a memory, a spirit, a dream, an ancestor, a trauma, a struggle, etcetera. Those catalysts can spark change, for good and for bad – depending on how we engage them.

Climate Change

One of the critical challenges of our time is climate change. We have heard debates on the causes and effects of climate change. What and who is responsible? What do we leave for our kids and grandkids? How do we mitigate? Who should foot the bill?

YES, the effects of climate change are devastating and evolving, and traumatic. But climate change is also a catalyst. It causes change; and it can inspire us to think and do things – differently.

At the 2024 Pacific Islands Forum held in Tonga, UN Secretary-General António Guterres identified the way humanity “treated [the sea] like a sewer” as part of the problem (see here). He called on “big emitters” to “step up and lead, by phasing out the production and consumption of fossil fuels and stopping their expansion immediately.”

How do we in Te Hāhi Weteriana / Methodist Church in Aotearoa New Zealand take this call as a catalyst/inspiration?

Climate Deniers

We have also heard some people, local and overseas, who deny climate change. Some members of our society deny responsibility for the destructive ecological changes. We can of course debate until the crows and the cows come home, but the bottom line is that climate change is taken to be a problem that needs to be reversed and resolved.

The debates around climate change have called attention to the damage and burdens that climate change brings upon the ecology, and the injustices and traumas that follow. Climate change is a big problem, and the heavy lifting falls upon poor and impoverished folx who contribute the least to the damaging and destruction of the ecosystem.

What if we see climate change as a catalyst? How might a change of attitude transform the way we understand and embrace climate change?

Native Calendars

To invite talanoa (story-telling, conversation) around the questions above, i offer two assertions – based on one of the native Tongan lunar calendars – relating to the life-world of Pasifika natives.

Reality based

First, in the Pasifika life-world, we know that reality often differs from expectations. In the Tongan yam calendar, for example, the three moon-cycles from mid-February to early-May are the rainy months when the yams grow the strongest. These are the spring months, and we expect the land to be green. That expectation is evident in the names of three moon-cycles – February-March: Vai-Mu‘a/early waters; March-April: Vai-Mui/later waters; April-May: Faka‘afu-Mo‘ui/lively growth.

But reality is often different, because February to April is also our hurricane season. The springing of life is disrupted. There is growth, and there is also damage. The Pasifika life-world provides reality-checks upon our expectations (inscribed into our calendars).

Disaster ready

Second, the life-world of Pasifika natives has space for disasters. There are thirteen moon-cycles in the Tongan yam calendar, and the names of three moon-cycles (October 15ish to December 27ish) anticipate struggles with the harshness of the ecosystem.

The September moon-cycle is when planting of the second season of yams takes place, and this will empty out the storehouses of families and villages. After the planting, there will not be a lot of food left for the next several months.

The three moon-cycles that follow are hotter-summery months, and their names warn Tongan natives to expect hardship and struggles: Fufū-ki-nekinanga (October moon-cycle) refers to a sunny, dry and deathly time of the year; ‘Uluenga (November moon-cycle) refers to a time when the ‘ulu/head of the land (that is, the leaves) is enga/yellow; ‘O‘oa-mo-fāngongo (December moon-cycle) warns Tongans that the sea will also be ‘sunny’ (hostile, antagonistic). Our spring season begins with the January moon-cycle, and the rains come with the February-March moon-cycle – along with the hurricanes.

Every year, three moon-cycles orient Tongans to hardships and struggles with ecological strains. Native Tongans are thus conditioned to prepare for facing and surviving ecological hardship. In this connection, the problem becomes a catalyst. And in my humble opinion, we could take the same approach toward climate change.

If our life-world orients toward hardship and toward learning to survive those hardships, instead of being oriented to prosperity - in the names of development and economics - then it would be easier for us to embrace climate as catalyst.

So what?

I present the assertions above to invite talanoa, and rethinking, of how we engage with climate change. We may not live in the Pasifika life-world, nor according to the Tongan lunar calendar, but there is space for considering if and how climate change is a catalyst. Also, there are opportunities in learning and engaging with native calendars.

# Versions of this reflection were published in Engage (Issue 16, August 2024) and Insights (10 September 2024, (see here)