Green God

An interesting element of the green movement is position taken by religious institutions. I have to confess that I am not very well versed in where they stand, or rather if they take any stand on the issue of environmental protection, climate change and the role that their believers should take.

A rumour I heard about fundamentalist American Christians (a long time ago) is that part of their belief is that accelerating environmental damage and climate change is part of the count down to judgement day. Apparently, since they all think they are saved and want to get away from the un-saved masses of the earth they don’t mind hurrying up the process. However, this might be all make belief, and is probably, no definitely, the view of a small fringe minority.

In the UK Guardian today they have an article on Bishop of London (that would be the Church of England for the poorly versed in religious authority) stating that it is a christian duty to save the planet. Apparently he practices what he preaches.

This brings me to my point. I’m fascinated, assuming my first generalization of fundamentalists was true, that people who read the same book and both seek essentially the same ultimate goal would have such different takes on how to act within our natural environment. The question then becomes how important a role will these differing views play in religious doctrine and what it means on a global whole. There are, approximately, 1 billion catholics and add the million more christians, and thats a lot of people who take guidance from the same source.

So, I wonder, what does the bible say about protecting, or not protecting, the earth? And what does it define as protection and stewardship?