RE: Are there any theists here who think God wants, or will take care of, Global Warming?
December 20, 2019 at 1:58 pm
(This post was last modified: December 20, 2019 at 2:07 pm by mordant.)
The narrative I usually hear is that "god is in control of something as big as the weather, not puny humans, ergo, he will not permit things to get out of hand". This is of course abject nonsense on multiple levels. It consigns the scientific consensus to the role of a conspiracy theory -- dubious at best, pernicious at worst.
There are two major schools of thought in the evangelical community on this. One is the dominionist view which says god has given humans dominion over "lesser" animals and this implies we can do whatever we want with / to them by something akin, apparently, to the divine right of kings. The other view might be termed the stewardship view, which is that the implication of dominion is that we are responsible to be "good stewards" and "take care" of the rest of creation, which generally leads to a more humble and ecologically responsible approach to nature and our place in it.
You can guess which view tends to dominate discourse these days.
Obviously there are mixtures of these two views, such as saying that we need to be kind to animals and to nature, but shouldn't take it to "extremes" such as believing that humans can end life as we know it. This may actually be the most common view, and it is nearly as bad as the "do what we want" view because in practical effect it cedes the determination of what constitutes an "extreme" view to the corporate world. It leads to people who don't kick their dogs when they're in a bad mood, but who also suspect the climate crisis is much ado about nothing.
It is taboo to even indirectly elevate man over god as a potent and determinative actor, which is what they feel acknowledging the climate crisis as an existential threat does. I am not sure why it never occurs to them to suggest, as they do in so many OTHER areas, that god may simply allow us to suffer the natural consequences of our actions if we are not responsible stewards of the animal "kingdom". Maybe it is their exceptionalist view of humans that makes them uncomfortable acknowledging people as a subset of animals, as it implies to them a denial of the eternal soul that supposedly makes humans a thing unto themselves.
What a tangled web they do weave, when religious dogma they do conceive.
There are two major schools of thought in the evangelical community on this. One is the dominionist view which says god has given humans dominion over "lesser" animals and this implies we can do whatever we want with / to them by something akin, apparently, to the divine right of kings. The other view might be termed the stewardship view, which is that the implication of dominion is that we are responsible to be "good stewards" and "take care" of the rest of creation, which generally leads to a more humble and ecologically responsible approach to nature and our place in it.
You can guess which view tends to dominate discourse these days.
Obviously there are mixtures of these two views, such as saying that we need to be kind to animals and to nature, but shouldn't take it to "extremes" such as believing that humans can end life as we know it. This may actually be the most common view, and it is nearly as bad as the "do what we want" view because in practical effect it cedes the determination of what constitutes an "extreme" view to the corporate world. It leads to people who don't kick their dogs when they're in a bad mood, but who also suspect the climate crisis is much ado about nothing.
It is taboo to even indirectly elevate man over god as a potent and determinative actor, which is what they feel acknowledging the climate crisis as an existential threat does. I am not sure why it never occurs to them to suggest, as they do in so many OTHER areas, that god may simply allow us to suffer the natural consequences of our actions if we are not responsible stewards of the animal "kingdom". Maybe it is their exceptionalist view of humans that makes them uncomfortable acknowledging people as a subset of animals, as it implies to them a denial of the eternal soul that supposedly makes humans a thing unto themselves.
What a tangled web they do weave, when religious dogma they do conceive.
