There is a need for models of sacrifice in society

Madeleine Bunting highlights the ideas of theologian Sarah Coakley in today's Guardian. Coakley argues that sacrifice needs to be restored as a central biological, ethical and theological principle. Far from sacrifice being an outmoded ritual, it is central to human experience:

'She cites recent evolutionary theory that puts sacrificial co-operation on a par with mutation and selection as a fundamental "principle" of evolution. "Individual evolutionary loss can be group evolutionary gain," she says.

Rather than imagining our genes as selfish, struggling in a race for the survival of the fittest, we can see evolution as requiring ceaseless sacrifices, small and large, to ensure the survival of the group ...

What makes Coakley's ideas so challenging is that, as she suggested in her 2012 Gifford lectures, "there is a need for models of sacrifice in a society" – that the existence of people dedicated to an "altruism beyond calculation" plays a critical role in challenging, inspiring and provoking the social order around them ...

We are living in an age of sacrifice on a near apocalyptic scale: a great extinction is under way with hundreds of species being eliminated as their habitats are destroyed. Looking at another dimension of this age of sacrifice, we have developed a global economy in which people's wellbeing and communities are routinely sacrificed for the sake of economic growth and efficiency – strange gods built on fantasies that allege rationality.

This is the ugly sacrifice that consumer capitalism attempts to conceal with its glamorous illusions and ideology of desire and entitlement, of self-fulfilment and self-expression. Capitalism offers speed, convenience and choice, but behind all of these lies sacrifice, from the poor working conditions of an exhausted workforce to the water-stressed cotton fields.

The urgency of us grasping the importance of sacrifice in human experience must surely be a vital part of any sustainable future.

Any proposal to slow down or reverse our destructive impact on the natural environment leads to talk of sacrifice on the part of consumers in western developed economies. Only when we understand how sacrifice can be a force for good have we any hope of restraining our destructive capabilities.'

Among other excellent Easter-themed coverage is John Dugdale's listing of 10 key Easter scenes to be found in writers ranging from Shakespeare to Yeats and Goethe to Tolstoy.

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Linda Perhacs - The Soul Of All Natural Things.