Water is strolling the red carpet a lot these days, from concerns about overhydration, Dead Sea water levels, and access to fresh water, among other things. Today’s Times article, “The Unintended Consequences of Hyperhydration,” illustrates another aspect of water’s newfound popularity. It traces concerns, from the late 60s, over the development of “bottle bill” programs that reward bottle recycling.

The article’s author, Jon Mooallem, emphasizes the complexities in the debate over bottle bills as well as the major players on both sides of the debate. New York State has taken significant steps in addressing the issues of water bottle recycling.

This year, the Bigger Better Bottle Bill campaign in New York is making its sixth attempt to redirect those unclaimed deposits — estimated at $100 million each year — into a state environmental fund.

I found the most intriguing element of the piece in the last section, entitled “Redemption.” The author meets with Rev. Dr. Earl Kooperkamp, the leader of Saint Mary’s Episcopal Church in Harlem, where he organizes a group called “Redeemers,” a group of “canners” who make their money from claiming bottles and cans strewed around town. Rev. Dr. Kooperkamp explained the source of inspiration for the group:

In Leviticus, the Bible issues laws about leaving the corners of your fields for the poor to harvest. ‘It’s saying that something has to be left that somebody else can make use of,’ he said. ‘What the Redeemers are doing is gleaning the fields, sustaining their lives in a way that actually ends up making life better for all of us.’

This connection strikes me as significant in light of the recent attempts (Ruether’s book Integrating Ecofeminism, Globalization, and World Religions, for example) to make connections between religious issues, environmental issues, and wider issues of globalization. Since Lynn White’s article “The Historical Roots of the Ecological Crisis,” there have been efforts in religious communities, particularly in Christian and Jewish communities, to demonstrate that these traditions actually support care for the earth. While the “Redeemers” support group may not be aware of these connections, the author of this piece is explicitly connecting these oft-disparate issues.

Hazon’s work, for instance, is in many ways at the center of this relatively new move to integrate these issues (connecting community building via environmentally sustaining activies, i.e. bike rides, and starting to address issues such as food politics via Tuv Ha’aretz CSA programs). Many other organizations are starting to work at these intersections as well as others possible intersections (such as globalization, class and race disparities, etc.) and there are innumerable possibilities for innovation in looking beyond simply the “religion is good for the environment” argument.

Earlier this year, I had similar thoughts about redeemers when a “canner” scoured the waste dumpster behind my apartment. Are these bottles and cans lost sparks, I asked? Are these canners raising the last sparks that we conveniently dispose of? In many ways, this feels like the case. Mooallem affirms the canners’ role,

‘Redemption is about taking something that is worthless and giving it value, about taking that worthless thing and changing it into something life-sustaining.’ Jean Rice, a canner in the Bronx, summed it up this way: ‘Five years ago, I used to call myself a canner. But now I call myself an ecological engineer.’

This redemption may look slightly different than the vision of redemption that we were raised with, but perhaps these canners know a secret to redemption that we should take inspiration from; namely, integrating larger issues of class and race disparities, as well as considerations of globalization, in our dialogue about religion and ecology.