christianity and the environment essays

Monday, 17 July 2006 Tyger Tyger burning bright, In the forests of the night; What immortal hand or eye, Could frame thy fearful symmetry? In what distant deeps or skies, Burnt the fire of thine eyes? On what wings dare he aspire? What the hand dare seize the fire? And what shoulder & what art, Could twist the sinews of thy heart? And when thy heart began to beat, What dread hand? & what dread feet? What the hammer? What the chain? In what furnace was thy brain? What the anvil? What dread grasp Dare its deadly terrors clasp! When the stars threw down their spears And water'd heaven with their tears: Did he smile his work to see? Did he who made the lamb make thee? Tyger Tyger burning bright, In the forests of the night: What immortal hand or eye, Dare frame thy fearful symmetry? There is something magical, mysterious, even marvelous about the tiger, as William Blake's 1794 poem indicates. The tiger is a perfect alpha predator, able to leap ten meters from a standing position, a ferocious killer. The largest of all the cats, it is both feared for its strength and revered for its beauty. Despite its prowess as a hunter, or perhaps because of it, the tiger has been brought to the brink of extinction by its only enemy, humankind. Three of eight tiger subspecies have disappeared in the last century (the Bali tiger in the 1940s, the Caspian tiger in the 1970s, and the Javan tiger in the 1980s), and only between 5,000 and 7,000 tigers remain in the wild, hunted for their hides and their organs, which are used in traditional medicines. Why is the fate of the tiger an appropriate topic for Christian reflection? The tiger reflects God's ingenuity and aesthetic sensitivity. It is a fearsome, beautiful animal that humans may hunt to extinction within a few decades. Some people, including Christians, think that humans have the right to do whatever they want to do to the planet.
Previous | Next Fall 1992 · Vol. 21 No. 2 · pp. 60–64 Daryl Kutz As concern for the environment has grown, the traditions of the Christian church have often been blamed as part of the present environmental crisis. Recent Christian thinking and writing has responded to this issue in a variety of ways. This variety results in part from differing perceptions of God. Six recently published books and documents present three differing pictures of God. At the risk of oversimplification, they include God as a person, as creation, and as a symbol. All three summaries came to similar conclusions on several key items. The differences lay in the theological underpinnings. GOD AS A PERSON The first picture portrays God as a living being desiring relationship with other living beings. God is the Creator, external to the physical world yet intimately involved with it. God is the source of all life and continues to sustain it. All of nature was created “good” by God and remains under God’s ownership. The authors whose books formed the first picture of God were all of the opinion that biological evolution 61 was the means by which God created the natural world. Intrinsic value is therefore present in creation because God placed it into the creative process. The planet is to be respected as another person’s property. Does common sense or faith shape responses to the environment? As the source of life, God can claim ownership of creation. Since creation was the product of divine love, there is the assurance that God will continue to care for it profoundly (Hallman, 1989). In return, all of nature, regardless of any human value placed upon it, is capable of giving glory to God. God has also provided a means by which right relationships can be restored as they once existed between God, nature and human beings. People are inextricably linked to this natural world. They were formed from.
by Martin LaBar  Like me, many Christians are convinced that following Christ includes helping to take care of the environment, being good environmental stewards. Some of the reason for this may be self-interest—we don’t want to burn down our house while we are living in it. But some of the reason for trying to care for nature around us stems from the fact that we think the Bible teaches that we should. Like me, many Christians like to find support for what they do, and don’t do, from scripture. Passages often used to support being careful with the environment include: Genesis 1:26-28, in which the first humans were told that they were to “have dominion.” Psalm 24:1: The earth is Yahweh’s, with its fullness Psalm 50:10: For every animal of the forest is mine, and the livestock on a thousand hills. I know all the birds of the mountains. The wild animals of the field are mine. the world, and those who dwell therein. Psalm 104:24: Yahweh, how many are your works! In wisdom have you made them all. The earth is full of your riches. There is the sea, great and wide, in which are innumerable living things, both small and large animals. Jeremiah 2:7: I brought you into a plentiful land, to eat its fruit and its goodness; but when you entered, you defiled my land, and made my heritage an abomination. Other passages are also used. Almost all such support comes from the Old Testament. I have used Old Testament passages in teaching biology classes at a Christian college, and, as appropriate, in my church. But in the back of my mind, I wondered if there were good New Testament-based arguments for helping take care of the environment, as well. A few years ago, it suddenly occurred to me that there are at least two arguments that I have never used, one entirely from the New Testament, and one partly from it. I am not aware that anyone else has presented them. Perhaps that’s because.
Vol. X • 1988       Christian Stewardship of the Environment by John E. Silvius God, out of timeless eternity, created the heavens and the earth, and then ceased His creative activity, and rested. (Genesis 2:1-2). And God saw all that He had made, and behold, it was very good (Genesis 1 :31). There was once a time when the earth, the creatures, and the natural resources were seen by the Creator as being good. The ! created order was a perfect testimony of the wisdom and ! greatness of the Creator. Today, we live on the same planet, but it seems that all is not good. The evidence is everywhere in our environment. Instead of life-sustaining rain from the heavens, we receive acid rain. Millions in developing nations suffer because ~ of water shortages or water supplies that are contaminated by; toxic chemicals or disease organisms. Expanding deserts, drought, I and famine are affecting millions of lives daily. Even in America, the growth and prosperity of whole communities are threatened by dwindling water supplies. The soil that nourishes us, the air that ~ we breathe, and the fuels for our industries, cars, and homes are; also diminishing in quantity and quality. This depressing list of environmental problems should not be a surprise to those who understand the Scriptures which teach that the curse of sin was placed upon man and the creation as a result of man's disobedience to God. Therefore, the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now (Romans 8:22). But thanks be to God who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of His dear Son. (Colossians 1:13). Nevertheless we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, wherein righteousness dwells (Il Peter 3:13). Those who have confessed their sin and acknowledged their need of the Savior.
Christianity and The Survival of Creation By Wendell Berry I confess that I have not invariably been comfortable in front of a pulpit; I have never been comfortable behind one. To be behind a pulpit is always a forcible reminder to me that I am an essayist, and in many ways a dissenter. An essayist is, literally, a writer who attempts to tell the truth. Preachers must resign themselves to being either right or wrong; an essayist, when proved wrong, may claim to have been just practicing. An essayist is privileged to speak without institutional authorization. A dissenter, of course, must speak without privilege. I want to begin with a problem: namely, that the culpability of Christianity in the destruction of the natural world, and the uselessness of Christianity to any effort to correct that destruction, are now established cliches of the conservation movement. This is a problem for two reasons: First, the indictment of Christianity by the anti-Christian conservationists is, in many respects, just. For instance, the complicity of Christian priests, preachers, and missionaries in the cultural destruction and the economic exploitation of the primary peoples of the Western Hemisphere as well as of traditional cultures around the world, is notorious. Throughout the five-hundred years since Columbus's first landfall in the Bahamas, the evangelist has walked beside the conqueror and the merchant, too often blandly assuming that his cause was the same as theirs. Christian organizations, to this day, remain largely indifferent to the rape and plunder of the world and of its traditional cultures. It is hardly too much to say that most Christian organizations are as happily indifferent as most industrial organizations to the ecological, cultural, and religious implications of industrial economics. The certified Christian seems just as likely as anyone else to join the.