It was in Japan where she grew up that Janette McIntosh first understood the connection between the environment and humanity. In the concrete jungle of Osaka, where the smell of burning rubber wafted from working class homes, McIntosh saw her neighbours struggling to make ends meet while their health deteriorated, the result of small manufacturing shops in their basements. She also remembers the fresh smell of sushi and the glorious month each summer when her family – three siblings and missionary parents Rev. Jack and Beth McIntosh – would escape to Lake Nojiri for vacation. "I realized there's a beautiful world out there of God's creation and wonder to be thankful for."
Thanks in part to her parents' social justice influence, this mother of two and elder at West Point Grey, Vancouver, has committed her life to studying how the well-being of the planet and its people intersect and affect each other. "Solely focusing on the environment isn't good enough," McIntosh told the Record. "It's broader than that. The environment encompasses the social dimension and the human aspects of life."
She speaks instead of sustainability; how the environment sustains human life and how humans can help sustain the Earth. As a member of Canada World Youth back in 1982, McIntosh travelled to Indonesia, where she saw how the environment-poor sanitation and dirty water-affected the health of the people who lived there (and how the lack of awareness and education among locals contributed to the problem). "There was a significant shift in me and in looking at the ways to work in the preventative health care field."
After completing a degree in environmental health at Ryerson University, she became a public health inspector and then earned her masters in community health and epidemiology. McIntosh included courses on social and environmental issues as determinants of health, and how people, places and time are all connected. "It furthered my quest of finding out why people get sick."
She was the coordinator of a taskforce at the University of British Columbia that studied the resources needed to sustain life. Transportation, land use and energy consumption were all considered. It was posited that two more planets would be needed to sustain the lifestyle most Canadians enjoyed.
Her passion continued even as a homemaker. "I put my heart into my home and family life and I put my expertise and interests into their communities. I bring broader social issues into the discussion and offer what I can to support initiatives the teachers take around environmental topics."
Along with encouraging her son's school to concentrate on reducing, reusing, not just recycling, she also teaches a program called Roots of Empathy, where school children are taught social and empathy skills in the hope it will lead to respect for one another – and the Earth. "There is a connection in how we relate with the environment and with other human beings," said McIntosh. "If you have a natural care for people, why wouldn't that connect with a concern for the environment, and vice versa?"
She is encouraged that the Presbyterian Church has made statements in the past concerning stewardship of the Earth (General Assembly passed a mission statement in 1995 "to use God's gifts wisely and fairly for the good of all"), but is dismayed that she hasn't heard much about it from a practical standpoint.
Still, her congregation returned to this statement and created its own mission statement on greening. They hold an annual worship service focusing on the environment, and hymns and prayers with an emphasis on creation and stewardship are used regularly. The hydro company has even been invited to conduct an energy and cost analysis, to let them know where they can save both. Eventually, she hopes all the congregation's committees will develop a focus of behaving in ways that have less of an impact on the Earth.
McIntosh is also involved with KAIROS, the ecumenical social justice organization. Its current campaign on water (endorsed at last year's assembly) is something she believes in strongly. "It goes right back to my main concern and why I pursued this work in the first place," she said. "I feel called and compelled to share the concerns of developing countries and in the modern, urban context."
