Spirituality and Ecological Hope

Fostering Ecological Hope

Today from Margaret Swedish:

We have been hearing lately that some in the religious world are beginning to appreciate the threat of global warming and climate change to ‘civilization.’  As ecosytems begin to break down, as drought spreads through much of the food-producing parts of the world (like our US southwest, where only an increasingly overstretched, depleting irrigation system makes food production possible), societies may begin to break down into survivalist mode.  The result could be wars and social conflicts and terrorism by which our current era may pale by comparison

Even the US Pentagon is aware of this threat and is making military plans accordingly, a reality that, frankly, puts a chill down my spine.

Anyway, one of my colleages just sent this news article from a Catholic publication in Australia, so I share it with you.  Dr. Colin Butler, senior researcher on global health at Deakin University “painted a grim picture of the catastrophic consequence of global warming as communities worldwide competed for scarce resources.”  He said this to a gathering at a Catholic conference in Melbourne.

We have also heard much recently about the movement within the evangelical community in the US suddenly realizing that the Bible does not call for conflagration, for human destruction of God’s Creation, but rather care of it for the good of all.  We have problems with this ’stewardship’ model, because it still reaffirms the dominance of the human over the rest of nature, as if the two are separate;  but it nevertheless is moving us in the right direction — to a deeper awareness that the fate of the planet is our fate as well, and that we are responsible for how our actions and way of life impact the rest of natural creation.

For a thoughtful essay on the currents within Christianity as it addresses ecology, go here.  The Forum on Religion and Ecology out of Harvard University is one of our most prominent academic institutions addressing the critical crossroads between religion and ecology.

Religion often appears a real obstacle to getting out of our crisis.  It must become not just an ally but one source of a renewed, radical spirituality that can help change our view, our experience of the human within the sacredness of all Creation.