Christians and the Environment?

One day last week, in my introduction to environmental studies class, Dr. Brad Daniel brought up the fact that, oftentimes, Christianity is not mentally connected to the environmental movement. We just often don't display that much interest in what happens to the world around us. We'll fight for unborn children and the sanctity of marriage, but we seldom show concern for the creation we inhabit.

Many are surprised to find that Montreat, a tiny little Christian college in the backwaters of western North Carolina, is very environmentally aware and active in the environmental education movement.

This is really a sad fact. Many non-Christians find our apparent lack of interest in the environment a turn-off to our beliefs. We contradict ourselves. "If you say that God made the whole world, why don't you care more about it? I mean, it's the work of his very hands, if what you say is true! So why don't you take better care of it?"

I, for one, want to break this mold. I am both an English major and an environmental studies major. I may want to be an environmental educator later, or an environmental lawyer. Tonight, I saw "Kilowatt Ours" for the kickoff of the Dorm Energy Competition. It gave me some ideas for living an environmentally sound lifestyle once I graduate from college (and probably grad school). But I've also got ideas for living in a more "green" fashion while I'm still here at Montreat, and the energy challenge is a good start. Also, I want to keep on top of things. I want to learn about God's creation-- how it works, and how best to care for it.

I'm a gardener. Have been for almost as long as I can remember. I have a beautiful and extensive flower garden in front of my house in New Hampshire. I love birds, too. They are the tiny little passions of my life, next to words and punctuation. But some day, the birds might be gone. That won't be for hundreds of years if it happens at all, but still. I don't want that to happen. And, as demonstrated in several episodes of Star Trek, if you alter the course of something by just a few degrees a long distance from its target, it'll end up lightyears off-course. If I can make a tiny little dent today, it might someday have enormous reverberations. The same is true of living in an environmentally injurious fashion. Your small action could even mean human lives in later centuries. A sobering conviction.

So how 'bout it? Are you ready to break some stereotypes? 'Cause I sure am!