Environmental Theology...
ENVIRO-Theology Or Pan-Theology?
by
Dr. Andrew Corbett
A world without trees would
be a world without bees which would become a world without
birds which would become a world without natural pest control
made worst by the desperately high rates of carbon dioxide
in the atmosphere and the dangerously low levels of oxygen
available which would cause a rise in the rate of global warming
and an even bigger hole in the ozone layer thus increasing
the rapid demise of the few remaining forms of human life within
an estimated period of about 5 years. Should we be concerned?
It's claimed that the Amazon rain forest is apparently
being cut down at an equivalent rate of several MCG stadiums every
hour! In Indonesia there are thousands of acres of old growth forests
being cut down and burned at an alarming rate. Many parts of Australia
have now been turned into dust-bowls and salinity-danger-zones due
to the belligerent destruction of bushland. Globally, rainforests
are being destroyed at the following rates-
- 2.47 acres (1 hectare) per second: equivalent to
two U.S. football fields
 150
acres (60 hectares) per minute- 214,000 acres (86,000 hectares) per day: an area
larger than New York City
- 78 million acres (31 million hectares) per year:
an area larger than Poland
- In Brazil
5.4 million acres per year (estimate averaged for period 1979-1990)
- 6-9 million indigenous people inhabited the Brazilian
rainforest in 1500.
A
GROWING YOUTH MOVEMENT
All around the world there appears
to be a growing movement of young people who are deeply and passionately
concerned about the conservation of the environment. This is evidenced
by the rise of "single issue" Green political parties
which generally attract younger people who are disenchanted with the
mainstream political parties and their seeming inactivity when it
comes to environmentalism.
The basic premise behind the growing
environmental movement is that we are losing forever valuable old
growth forests which deserve to preserved. By keeping such forests
we are helping to sustain the wildlife and insect-life which depends
upon these forests for their survival, and therefore ultimately we
are helping to sustain human life as well.
A
CHRISTIAN RESPONSE IS URGENTLY NEEDED
The response to this worldwide concern
over the state of our old growth forests has generally been shallow
especially from the Evangelical and Neo-Evangelical (Pentecostals,
Charismatics, Seeker-Driven) segments of the Church. We can no longer
allow theological liberals to claim to be the only reasoned response
to Church's position on environmentalism. The reason for this is that
these theologically liberal scholars are biased to a worldview that
is at best described as deistic (God somehow initiated but did not
intervene in creation), and at worst can only be described as outright
nihilistic ("nothing"...there is no God). These
positions are clearly not acceptable to those who have a higher regard
for the authority of the Scriptures.
UNDERSTANDING
"WORLDVIEWS"
We all view the world through a window
which interprets for us what we see. For the Christian our "window"
helps us to interpret life as a deliberate gift from God who actively
cares for this world via intervention, the ultimate of which was when
the Word became flesh. He has created all life by His fiat command
and placed man (His image bearer) as the crown of that creation. God
has given the earth as a gift to man whom He has commissioned to exercise
management over.
But for many naturalists, their window
causes them to view the world through a window which causes them to
interpret life as a fragile result of random, chaotic, chemical reactions
which have developed through billions of years of death and struggle
filtering out the least adapted and producing what we have today.
Within this worldview, life has come from natural matter and diverged
into its various forms. Therefore, all life (human, animal, insect,
plant) is of equal value. This worldview is clearly the philosophy
behind certain segments of the animal rights and nature conservation
movements. Increasingly, it is beginning to influence the worldview
of Christians as well perhaps largely due to the current vacuum in
Christian thinking in this area.
MODERN
ENVIRONMENTALISM'S SPIRITUALITY
The worldviews of Biblical Christianity
and Naturalism are opposite. Little wonder. On the one hand we have
the belief that God gave life to man, while on the
other hand we have the generally unspoken belief that man
gave life to God (that is, man in his ignorance, prior to his
scientific discoveries, created God as an explanation for
the universe). The Bible is the inspired Word of God or
it is the invented word of man. Jesus Christ was either God
in the flesh or just another good man. There is either a Lawgiver
who has revealed His laws to man, or the only law common to man is
don't hurt anyone (or thing).
Little wonder that these almost religious
environmentalists are keen to dismantle what they regard as the "old"
worldview of Christianity. This encompasses an agenda of Gay rights,
Animal rights, Removal of Religious privileges (such as Blasphemy
laws, Sunday trading regulations, and the redefining of Religious
Vilification targeted at Christians) and the scathing attacks on (what
they regard as) anachronistic institutions (particularly the Church).
Professing to be wise, they
became fools, and changed the glory of the incorruptible God into
an image made like corruptible man; and birds and four-footed animals
and creeping things.
Romans 1:22-23
This worldview regards all forms and
expression of life from an absolutely egalitarian view point. This
means, animal and plant life is equal in value to human life; gender
distinctions are irrelevant; and, sexual orientation is irrelevant.
Ultimately it is not God who gives life to all, it is nature (what
is natural, matter) that has given life to all. Thus God is not just
in nature, He is nature. That is, He is not merely in the
trees, He is the trees. This is actually a theological system known
as pan-theism.
who exchanged the truth of God
for the lie, and worshiped and served the creature rather than the
Creator, who is blessed forever. Amen.
Romans 1:25
Christians should recognise that this is the driving
spirit behind much of the environmental movement. It has arisen to
fill the spiritual vacuum created by an abdication of Christian thought
on the matter.
BIBLICAL
ENVIRONMENTALISM
Then God blessed them, and
God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth
and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the
birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the
earth." And God said, "See, I have given you every herb
that yields seed which is on the face of all the earth, and every
tree whose fruit yields seed; to you it shall be for food.
Genesis 1:28-29
The Biblical worldview includes God's
prescription for the management of creation: animal, insect, and plant
life. Creation was never meant to be abused by environmental vandalism.
But neither was meant to take dominion over man. Man alone bears the
image of God and as such takes a place of honour in the order of creation.
This highest privilege carries with it commensurate responsibility.
To claim that man has the right to
entirely destroy irreplaceable eco-systems in the name of being God's
agents of dominion over the earth is unsupportable from Scripture.
One could only imagine the scene of God coming down in the cool of
the day to visit Adam to find that Eden had been completely felled
and Adam was preparing to develop and subdivide this new land release!(?)
"When you besiege a city
for a long time, while making war against it to take it, you shall
not destroy its trees by wielding an ax against them; if you can
eat of them, do not cut them down to use in the siege, for the tree
of the field is man's food.
Deuteronomy 20:19
The Scriptures teach a high regard
for nature: both animals and trees. Its worth remembering that it
was Christians who started the RSPCA and many other environmentally
minded organisations. The Scriptures teach that we are stewards over
God's creation.
A righteous man regards the
life of his animal,
But the tender mercies of the wicked are cruel (toward animals).
Proverbs 12:10
Christians should be on guard against
any worldview which removes God as Creator and therefore as the Life
and Law Giver. We must live out the revelation that in the beginning
was the Word, by Whom all things exist, who around 2,000 years ago
became flesh and dwelt among us. He calls to be stewards of this Creation,
not to worship it.
Dr. Andrew Corbett
© Andrew Corbett, Legana, Tasmania,
20th December 2003
|
