In the run-up to the last presidential election, the 30 million-member National Association of Evangelicals adopted a resolution affirming “that God-given dominion is a sacred responsibility to steward the earth and not a license to abuse the creation of which we are a part.” A year ago, more than 1,000 church leaders signed a statement cautioning Bush that “there was no mandate, no majority, or no ‘values’ message in this past election for the president or Congress to roll back and oppose programs that care for God’s creation.”
One of the religious trends I’ve found most applause-worthy over the past year or so is the growing commitment among Conservative Evangelicals to the environment. For many, many years, you would never have heard “Evangelical” and “Environmentalist” in the same sentence. Now that’s beginning to change as Christians begin to recognize the importance of wise stewardship, and while I might normally bash Evangelical Christians for being rather late to the party, I strongly believe that their new-found and growing devotion to the environment can only be a good thing.
The recognition that how we care for our environment is a moral issue, while a long time in coming, is certainly valid and worthy of being taken seriously. While you may not necessarily agree with their politics or religion, if they’re serious about being good stewards of the environment, isn’t that at least a little bit of common ground? The fact that, at least in one respect, they happen to differ with Our Glorious Leader, is certainly enough to bring a smile to this old Liberal’s face.
It is hardly news that environmentalists are critical of the Bush administration’s track record on issues ranging from climate change, to mineral exploration on public lands, to the gutting of the Endangered Species and Clean Water acts. What is new is that the latest chorus criticizing his environmental policies comes from deep within the president’s political base….
The idea that the Bible gives humanity “dominion” over the earth is nothing new to U.S. religion or politics. Early colonists brought the notion with them from England, christening this “New World” a second Eden, a vast garden there for the tilling. The agricultural/industrial complex was built on this fertile metaphorical foundation.
So President Reagan’s Secretary of the Interior James Watt could praise national parks as “cathedrals to the wonder of nature and to the glory of the Creator.” This at the same time he was authorizing massive mineral and timber exploitation on public lands, and declining to set aside any more pristine wilderness for protection. Fittingly, critics dubbed Bush’s recently resigned Interior secretary, Gale Norton, “James Watt in a skirt.”
But many evangelical Christians are profoundly uneasy with such an interpretation of the biblical injunction to “be fruitful and multiply and replenish the earth, and subdue it.” Calling themselves “Creation Care” activists rather than “environmentalists” (a designation they associate with liberals, secularists and Democrats), they represent the conservative wing of a broader movement within American Christianity that scholars refer to as “ecotheology.”
Unlike their generally more left-leaning colleagues, these folks are not tree-huggers: Many are skeptical about things such as the hole in the ozone layer and acid rain, and they are socially conservative on issues such as overpopulation. They nonetheless represent a sea change in the relationship between religion and environmental politics.
I remember a couple of years ago, when the website What Would Jesus Drive? first appeared on the Internet. At the time, it was the butt of many jokes on late-night television. Why would Evangelicals be concerned with what Jesus would drive? What an absurd question…and what do Evangelicals care about the environment anyway? They’re too busy worshipping the ground Our Glorious Leader trods upon. Well, as it turns out, these folks were, and are, serious. WWJD is a serious attempt by a collection of Christians attempt to live their beliefs while doing their part to help make the world a better place.
If you read WWJD’s Statement on Climate Legislation, it’s easy to believe that this is a committed collection of Christians who believe that transportation and stewardship of the environment is a moral issue. When you consider, as WWJD did, that the environment is closely tied to the fate of the poor and dispossessed around the world, it’s not difficult to see why this is an issue attracting the attention of increasing numbers of Evangelicals.
To my way of thinking, this is what Christianity should be about. It’s not about rich, White Conservatives holding themselves up as superior human beings because of their narrow beliefs. It should be about people who choose to live their beliefs living a Christ-like life and working to make their world a better place. WWJD and others like them seem to be doing exactly that. We should be applauding them for living their beliefs, something that seems to happen far too seldom any more.
