Green Options

A comment on one of my posts last week gave me the idea of writing on the relationship between Christianity and the environment. Generally, when we think of this connection, many of us think about the “Religious Right” and their strong conservative beliefs and anti-environmental policies.

What is at the root of Christianity, though? Can anti-environmental language and beliefs be found in the Bible?

The Bible seems to proclaim that nature was made as it should be and is something that should be respected and protected. In Psalms 104:25,30, it is written: “In wisdom you made them all, the earth is full of your creatures. There is the sea, vast and spacious, teeming with creatures beyond number - living things both large and small…. When you send your Spirit, they are created and you renew the earth.” The general spirit is one of positivity and love here.

Fellow Green Options blogger, Sam Aola Ooko, recently related that there has been a reconciliation of religion and evolution.

As written in that EcoWorldly blog post — St. Charles Darwin Unveiled: Catholics, Anglicans Finally Agreed on Evolution — it seems that the Vatican and the Church of England have decided that there is a place in the world for both beliefs, that Charles Darwin’s Theory of Evolution and religious faith can coexist peacefully.

I’m fascinated.

I can understand, for example, the Christian view that the premise of evolution is faulty and can’t align with the belief that God created the Earth. Science says Earth dates billions of years back. The stories of the Bible say, “Oh, no it dih-n’t!”