How Real Christians Can Heal the Planet
The Book of Nature is a book to gift any Christian who does not see looking after the planet as high priority (think far-right evangelical Christians both here and in the US). Or to Christians (or anyone) who loves the planet, and sees it as a gift from God for us to look after.
For thousands of years, the natural world was our sacred text. By the Middle Ages, the text was given a name. But today when nature is damaged from disasters and human actions, we need again to return Nature as a place of refuge and retreat.
In this book, science and the wisdom of poets is weaved with a gentle spiritual practice, a framework of the Divine work of the Creator. God’s first revelation came to us through ongoing creations:
- The rumblings of the heavens
- The seasonal eruptions of earth
- The invisible pull of migration
- The tide and times of the oceans
- Celestial shiftings
Draw back into nature as a sacred encounter. We need look no further than the Divine to find Nature at its best.
I am attuned to the one who paints the dawn in tourmaline streaks and salts the night sky in chalky, sometimes brilliant flecks. The one who thought to quench the thirst of the migrating butterfly with mists of fog.
And remembered that baby birds might do well to memorise star-stitched tracings far, far above the nursery that is the nest.
Barbara Mahany is a writer whose work has been published in the Chicago Tribune for almost 30 years, mostly on nature, faith and family. She lives in Illinois, USA.
Permission to wonder, get curious and find God in the tiny details of a sprouting garden, a forest glade, birds in flight or the moon. Reminds us that there are different ways to encounter God all around us, beyond Scripture.
The Story of a Planet-Friendly Christian
Bodies on the Line is the story on how Christians (many of whom have not got involved before, strange considering it’s God’s planet) are waking up to the climate crisis. And rediscovering the radical nature of the teachings of Jesus Christ. They are asking what God needs them to do to help, and putting their bodies on the line to do it.
Why are ordinary Christians now breaking the law? For the incredulous and inspired alike, the author describes the experience, as she surveys our ecological, emotional and spiritual crisis, with the blinkers off. You might want to be sitting down!
Bishop Laurie Green calls this book ‘astonishing’. Rev’d Jon Swales says ‘Read this book. Weep. Pray and act’.
Climate change awareness is hampered by the efforts of the fossil fuel industry with its huge worldwide interests in oil, coal and gas; by their lobbyists, and by the newspaper industry, who continue to undermine the truth of climate change.
In doing so, they help governments to avoid taking the draconian measures required to stop developing new coal mines and oil fields, fracking for gas or laying new pipe lines. Or indeed expanding airports, motorways, high-speed trains and the weapons industry.
Sue Parfitt is an 80-year old Anglican priest, who in October 2022 was arrested for peacefully holding up signs to ask governments to take the climate emergency seriously (like failing to insulate all homes, which would immediately cut wasted energy and make bills affordable).
She says ‘Jesus said I am the way, the truth and the life. Not being able to tell the truth undermines our faith’.
Her inspiration for this book came from Father John Dear (who writes the foreword), an American Jesuit priest and campaigner for peace and animal welfare, who was even turned away from one sector of the Catholic church, yet thankfully remains a priest in California. We need more like him.
Christians & The Climate Change Crisis
It’s odd that some of the most fervent climate-change deniers are people who profess to be those of strong faith (right-wing evangelical Christians in particular – Trump supporters for instance). The evidence is there.
Scientists’ best estimate is that roughly 100% of warming since the mid-20th Century is caused by human activity. The main producers of greenhouse gases are electricity generation and transport.
Current research finds that if humans weren’t around, the climate would actually be cooling slightly. To avoid the worst impacts, we need to stop burning fossil fuels and transition to renewable energy. Dr John Cook
So why on earth do we have MPs still obsessed by economic growth and fossil fuels? One big contract was recently awarded by Rishi Sunak’s government. He is Hindu, most of his former Cabinet are Christians. If they are people of faith, why were they destroying our planet?
In the USA, many Christians act like Donald Trump is the second coming of Christ, even though he’s a loose cannon who denies climate change and wants more fossil fuels to ‘make America great again’.
One religious leader who is taking climate change seriously is Pope Francis. Also a fan of animal welfare (hence why he took his Papal name after St Francis of Assisi), he appears to be on the side of environmentalists, promoting simple living.
But the Catholic church itself does not fare so well (The Vatican even takes $30,000 a month in rent from McDonald’s – a company that has huge criticism for policies on environment and animal welfare).
When he was Archbishop of Buenos Aires, Fr Bergoglio (as he was then known) frequently took the bus. He’s known to cook his own meals, wears normal clothes, and lives in a small apartment (refusing the grand palace rooms).
Yorkshire’s Stanbrook Abbey has solar panels, rainwater harvesting and a sedum (living) roof. Green Sisters is a wonderful book about ‘eco-nuns’ who drive around in electric cars, and replace manicured gardens to grow free food for parishioners. The best line comes from Mother Superior ‘anyone who saw the Divine in a potato, could never turn it into Pringles!’
Sr Dorothy Stang was an American nun, who lived with tribes in the South American forest, campaigning to keep their homes from loggers. She was eventually murdered by two men, apparently praying for their forgiveness as she died.
Do other religions protect the planet? You would think so, but not always the case. Surprisingly, India’s holy Ganges river is one of the most polluted in the world.
Even street dogs have turned blue, from drinking and bathing in water that suffers toxic run-off from dye used for the western denim jeans industry.
How Our Planet Came to Life
Becoming Earth is a book for the creationists to read, on the real story of how earth came into being, giving also a major shift on how to save our planet.
Earth is a vast interconnected living system that over billions of years, has transformed a lump of orbiting rock into our cosmic oasis, breathing oxygen into our atmosphere and turning rock into fertile soil and creating massive oceans.
This is a book that in the words of Steve Silberman ‘weaves science and history, with the grace of a poet’.
When I was a boy, I thought I could change the weather. On sweltering summer days in suburban California, I would draw a picture of blue rain and march around it on the lawn, splashing it with a potion of hose water and yard trimmings.
As I grew up, so did my understanding of meteorology. I learned how water evaporates from lakes, rivers and oceans.
Rain, I was taught, is an inevitable outcome of atmospheric physics – a gift that we and other creatures passively receive.
And due to long-term atmospheric ripple effects, the Amazon rainforest contributes to rainfall as far away as Canada. A tree growing in Brazil can change the weather in Manitoba.
Ferris Jabr is a contributing writer for The New York Times and Scientific America. He lives in Oregon (US). This is his first book.
This wondrous book reveals our living planet for the miracle that it is. Carla Safina
We tend to take our rare jewel of a home planet for granted. In his startlingly beautiful book, the author shows us exactly why we shouldn’t. Deborah Blum
A science writer with a poet’s soul, Ferris is among the few scribes worthy of serving as biographer for the life-encrusted rock we call home. Ben Goldfarb
There are times reading this book, when you feel like you are peering right down into the very heart of our living planet. It is quite simply, a work of genius. Robert Moor
