One topic that the church has often overlooked is creation care, or how Christians are supposed to respond to environmental problems such as global warming. From air pollution to biodiversity issues, there are a multitude of problems that need to be addressed in order to help the Earth heal. God gave humans the world to steward and take care of, so Christians should be stepping up to the plate and leading the cause to help the planet rather than ignoring it.
Lynn White Jr.’s article, “The Historical Roots of Our Ecological Crisis,” showcases the need for creation care to be more widely talked about in the church. In his article, White pointed to the idea that Christian ideals related to nature are the cause of the present ecological crisis.
“We shall continue to have a worsening ecological crisis until we reject the Christian axiom that nature has no reason for existence save to serve man,” White wrote.
Interestingly, White wrote this article back in the 1960s, and yet, his article is still used and debated in many environmental circles today. While White was a practicing Christian, the fact that some in the world still see the Christian church as a root problem of the ecological crisis is concerning.
Recently, 204 students and alumni from colleges associated with the Council of Christian Colleges and Universities signed a letter to David Hoag, president of the council, asking for creation care to be prioritized in the group's advocacy and public policy efforts. In the letter, Hannah Mossbarger of Indiana Wesleyan University and Ellyn Miller of North Park University, emphasized that the letter is specifically coming at a time when actions in Washington, D.C., have come at direct odds with the belief that the earth is God’s good creation and should be prioritized as such.
This letter was a step in putting creation care back into conversations, but there is still much work to be done. When thinking about how Christians should be practicing creation care, it is important to consider how mankind’s relationship with nature was meant to be, as it was outlined during the creation account in Genesis.
“And God blessed them. And God said to them, ‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth and subdue it, and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the heavens and over every living thing that moves on the Earth,’” Genesis 1:28 (ESV).
Some Christians have interpreted the statement that we have dominion over the Earth as us having the freedom to do whatever we want with it; this is what White points to as the root of the ecological crisis. However, God didn’t give us dominion over the Earth to rule it with an iron fist; instead, he gave us the honor of being stewards of the land and helping it grow.
Environmental problems don’t need an answer from the church just because of our duty to the environment; the effects of environmental problems such as climate change around the world have also turned it into a justice issue. As climate change and other environmental issues begin to become a bigger problem, their effects are starting to be felt by more humans in addition to the plants and wildlife. The impact of climate change is being particularly felt in developing countries.
“Climate change is a human rights issue. All people should have the agency to live life with dignity. However, the climate crisis is causing loss of lives, livelihoods, language, and culture, putting many at risk of food and water shortages, and triggering displacement and conflict,” the United Nations Development Programme states.
Due to the circulation of carbon throughout the Earth’s atmosphere, carbon emissions from northern countries like the United States of America and Canada directly affect countries in the southern hemisphere, causing more extreme effects of climate change to be visible there. So while we are the ones doing the damage, we don’t feel the effects as strongly. This doesn’t mean that we should just sit back and let others take care of environmental problems, though.
“Christians are called to proclaim the good news of Jesus, but we are also called to witness in acts of mercy, self-control and justice. By caring for God’s creation, we can witness to the world that we believe in a creator God, who in turn cares deeply about those He created. We can share that He created the world to be enjoyed, not to be abused or made unsafe,” the Evangelical Alliance, a UK-based Christian nonprofit, states.
One question that comes up with all this is: if it is our duty as Christians to take care of the Earth and those that inhabit it, then to what lengths should we go to do so? A common term thrown around in environmental circles is “conservation.” Conservation means “The protection, preservation, management, or restoration of natural environments and the ecological communities that inhabit them,” as outlined by the United States Department of Agriculture.
While some conservation groups do go the extra mile to really try to preserve and maintain the land that they have been given charge over, others see conservation as simply keeping land “wild.” This idea can lead to harmful monocultures being put onto the land. Just planting random tree species isn’t going to cut it if those trees don’t have a niche within that given environment – either they will die off or they will invade the land. Christians should go a step further to engage in something called “Reconciliation Ecology.”
Dr. Dave Warners, a biology professor at Calvin University, wrote in “Reconciliation Ecology: A New Paradigm for Advancing Creation Care” that truly restoring the land to its intended state of being requires a community commitment.
“Instead of working to take care of a creation that resides ‘out there’ some place, reconciliation ecology emphasizes that we are part of creation – our bodies, our buildings, our cars, our yards, etc. – and it challenges people everywhere to live in their own places in ecologically affirming ways that enhance biodiversity and restore ecological functionality to their own local places,” Warners wrote.
Essentially, the difference between reconciliation ecology and conservation is that reconciliation ecology focuses on restoring the harmony or balance between humans and creation. Reconciliation ecology also addresses the social justice aspect of environmental problems, bringing communities together in order to find the root of the problem and fix it together.
Environmental problems cannot be fixed by just one person or just one group of people. In order to address the environmental issues facing our world today, we need to not only tackle them as a whole community but also focus on bringing balance back to the human-nature relationship. This relationship may have been broken by the Fall, and won’t be properly restored until God’s second coming, but we can try our best to recover as much as possible of the harmony that once was.
God gave man dominion over the Earth, but that doesn’t mean we have the right to do with it whatever we please. Instead, we are called to steward the land, taking care of all that inhabits it, including our fellow man. In order to do so, we not only need a mindset shift from dominance to stewardship, but also a change in our behavior. We need to start treating the Earth with the right behavior and seek restoration of the broken relationship between man and Earth.
Photo Courtesy of Adeline Gruen