Saving the Planet

This is an important week, at least in terms of world politics. The gathering in Copenhagen to address the issue of climate change is an important event no matter what we might think about the question. This is a gathering of world figures around a discussion that apparently concerns us all--not all the people in the room or all the people in the nation or in a particular region but in the world. Again, I do not know whether or not the gathering merits the urgency that seems to surround it but in some ways it makes no difference. The fact that there are this many people, representing this many countries gathered to one place to discuss anything at all is monumental. Or so it seems to me.

The title of my blog is purposeful to the extent that I wanted to echo the emotional tone of the discussion. I recently was listening to a radio news show that was covering the summit in Copenhagen. It began with the voices of children. They were clearly representing different countries and many were speaking a language that was not their native tongue. Yet, each child said the same thing, and in English: Please save the world...

It is always a risk to get children to do our bidding for us. The image of children spurs strong emotions. But it is not easy to predict which emotions will emerge. For example, consider the "Children's Crusade" of the middle period. Sending children to do the bidding of the Church or bring the message of God might initially sound charming but give it some time and it turns a bit--mostly in the stomach. The picture of kids entering the Holy Land to face the same hostile forces that already slaughtered thousands of adults is likely to inspire a few descriptives but charming is probably not one of them.

Such was my impression of hearing the voices of children proclaiming the urgency of the Conference on Climate Change. Not so much because it was personally dangerous but because it was such a blatant example of exploitation. Whatever comes out of Copenhagen is destined to be both controversial and politically charged. There are going to be some people who are happy and some people who are furious about whatever happens next. Why would you want to associate children with this. No matter what it is going to appear exploitative... because it is...

But some might argue that why not play every card available. After all, isn't this a matter of life and death? Should we not use every resource at our disposal to drive home the serious nature of this issue???? My answer here would be "no." Using children is not OK for any crusade--no matter how righteous it might appear. In addition to the example above, here are two more reasons.

First, my point here has nothing to do with the question of global warming or its urgency. Of course, children are going to suffer whatever the future brings. Reminding delegates or watchers of this only insults their intelligence and calls their integrity into question. Call me idealistic but I just sort of assume that anyone who is attending something called, "The United Nations Climate Change Conference," has at least some authentic interest in future generations.

Second, "Please Save The World" is a hugely unfaithful thing to say. Therefore, putting such words in the mouths of children is especially despicable. I think most Christians would accept that humans cannot save the world. But it is equally true that humans cannot destroy the world. We might wreak havoc on the plant but just as we did not make the world, it is neither our's to destroy. That work belongs to God.

This point was brought home to me twice in my lifetime by two very different people. The first was a liberal Christian pastor. The second was an orthodox Christian theologian.

Some twenty-five years ago, I was driving in a car on the way to Colorado with a friend. He and I and a number of others were going to Estes Park to climb Long's Peak. I had just finished college and was attending Divinity School so my mind was alive with ideas and my spirit was filled with purity. At one point, I began talking about the environment and how humans tear it up so well. I don't know what sparked my enthusiasm exactly; perhaps we were passing a feed lot or something. There are certainly plenty of examples of the topic on the road from Des Moines to Estes Park.

Anyway, I raged on for a few minutes about everything from water pollution to strip mining. I finally stopped to catch my breadth and wait for an atta-boy from my mentor. But instead he said something that rather surprised me. He said, I think you underestimate the earth. It's taken everything that we've thrown at it thus far. The planet has a marvelous way of healing itself...

WHAT?! I thought to myself. How is this helping? Why isn't this guy sharing my righteous indignation? But I had just enough humility left to think a little about what I had just heard... And I've been thinking about it ever since.

Then about a year later I was sitting back in class at the Divinity School. Our professor was talking to us about the arrogance of modern Christianity. He said, many people in the Church would have you believe that it's all up to us--the proclamation, the poor, the planet--it's not. We're just creatures here. This is God's world to make, to judge, to redeem... We don't have the authority to destroy the world. That's God's business.

The first time we hear something like this, we say, "of course but." The of course means that while we acknowledge God...it is sort of a mute point because we're the only ones here--the only ones who can have an impact... But the real of course is that this is an unfaithful thing to say. If we truly believe that this is God's world then does this not mean that it will always be God's world? That at any given moment it remains God's world? And so, while our influence might appear profound to us; all is probably not as we imagine.

Now, does this mean that we should not be concerned about things like Global Warming? Or, that we should not gather with other nations to discuss better and worse ways to live and work and behave on the planet? Of course not. But it does change the starting point. While I am not especially excited about an urgent gathering to "save the world;" I can certainly see the value of an urgent gathering to rethink our place on it and our relation to it... To speak of our role as faithful stewards and humble servants of the God's generous trust.

Things like exploitation and pollution are just plain wrong quite without threatening the end of civilization. These things should have our attention long before we hear the voices of children or threats concerning the end of the world. That's the confession--that it takes such hyperbole to capture our interest... But the Good News is that God is God and this really is God's world. And the earth, which is part of God's world, is pretty amazing. Though we humans tend to be quite impressed with ourselves and, in this case, our ability to break things; the fact is, we have only been around for a few thousand years. The earth has seen things that we have never seen. It has endured things--truly catastrophic things--that we might not even be able to imagine.

As humans, we surely might be in danger of destroying ourselves...we always are... But we're really not in a position to destroy God's world.