Thecology: can ecology and theology grow in the same backyard?

Thecology: can ecology and theology grow in the same backyard?

Lava fields in the ever-changing geology of Iceland.

This is part 1 of a three-part series leading up to Easter, to explore some of the distorted theology that is espoused by some Christians about the environment. It's my meagre effort to restore some of the balance and hopefully to generate some discussion.   

Firstly, apologies to regular readers of my blogs who aren't into theology. It is a bit of a deviation for me, and my only qualification is that I love both this incredible world, and the divine, and have wondered for years why so many lovers of either one of those seem to fail to love the other. To me, as it seems to be to so many of the indigenous peoples across the planet, the two are closely linked.

Like so much mythology, let's start at the beginning. Over the following blogs, I'll develop some of these ideas a bit further.

The ancient Jewish scripture, which we know in contemporary bibles as "Genesis", or "The Beginning", starts off with the wonderful, empowering words: "In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth." Why is that empowering? I guess because it starts off with a couple of encouraging assumptions: that this universe is not just a random coincidence, that the divine being is outside of time itself (ie, it wasn't "in the beginning God somehow came into being by a random assimilation of matter") so therefore is bigger than certainly most of our puny imaginations, and that this divine being is also creative.

So far so "good". Because we're told that the creation itself is "good". Not something "bad" that needs to be tamed or put in its place by humans, but it is good.

Science has proved over and over, and in many, many different ways, that this precious little space ball of ours has a long, long history of chaos and massive change. Mountains have been heaved up and cast into the sea, volcanoes have exploded their fiery innards, ice ages have come and gone – in fact climate change has been almost the only constant as continents have smashed into each other and been ripped apart again. We continue to see these immense natural forces at work in places such as Iceland, where earthquakes and volcanoes are an almost daily occurrence.

Some time very late in this chaotic life of our planet, humans became part of the scene. And this is where some really twisted theology often takes place. In Genesis, we hear a creation fable about the first humans doing what God didn't want them to do (they ate the forbidden fruit). This is often referred to as "original sin" – the moment when evil was introduced into the world (let's forget for a moment that the evil, suggestive snake was already there). And according to most modern Christian theology , all problems in the world – including "environmental" – can be traced back to this time.

This gives Christians such a ridiculously easy "out" when people question why there is so much pain and suffering in the world. "Oh, God didn't intend for that - it was brought here by humankind's sin." Admittedly, this is plausible when much of the pain and suffering in the world can be attributed to humankind's greed, gluttony and general pigheadedness.

However, what really gets my not-so-holy goat is that natural catastrophic forces such as earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis etc are also ascribed to be a result of this "original sin". That if neither Adam or Eve had favoured apple juice that day, that earthquakes, volcanoes, floods etc wouldn't exist.

What rot! Our planet has been subject to these vast forces since time began: storms, floods, droughts, creation of species, extinction of species. Vast canyons have been gouged out and filled in, seas and come and gone, lava has spewed forth and created countless mountains.

What if this "good" world that God created was meant to be full of this power? That it isn't a "mistake" or a result of "sin" but that Homo sapiens are merely one species on the spinning globe, and it will continue to explode and grind and rise and fall despite us being here.

I honestly believe that one of the biggest problems in reconciling ecology with theology is that we continue to view the divine solely from a human perspective. Heck, I've heard it preached many, many times that humans are the "pinnacle" of God's creation, and that all the realms and wonders of the universe have been created for us to enjoy or to point us to God. It's this sort of thinking that ultimately leads so many Christians to deny that evolution even exists. It is too terrifying to think that we, Homo sapiens – God's chosen ones – might not be the end of the line. That we might be superseded. Or worse, that we might just be wiped off the planet as so many other species before us.

What if the Creator being, in their incredible creativity, grace and wisdom beyond any of our understanding, has created a "good" world in which massive tectonic and geomorphic change will continue to occur as long as the planet has a sun to go around? And that we humans are first-hand spectators of this incredible power, as we ride our ball of dust around and around?

How would this thinking of theology change our thinking on ecology?

Maybe it would stop some people immediately blaming God when there is drought or floods or other things that affect humans catastrophically, and pleading through prayer to "make it rain" or "make it stop.

Maybe we'd have to take hold of again what it means to be compassionate, and to look after our fellow humans on the ride, to comfort the grieving, to feed the poor. To build our cities wisely and without greedily putting developments on floodplains. Maybe we wouldn't be as terrified of modern science, and all it can reveal - whether it's the  number of species now shown to exhibit homosexual behaviour, or the latest news on human-induced climate change.

Maybe we could begin to recognise that we humans are now virtually a "virus" on the planet, consuming and destroying everything else in order that we may live. And that we need to stop doing that.

And maybe, just maybe, those few of us who are firm believers in the divine, but who have a heart for the environment, won't be branded just as godless extremists by other believers, or as dangerously deluded by non-believers, but as those who are trying to reconcile all we know of the divine, with all we know of our modern world.

As we approach Easter, once celebrated as a pagan festival Ishtar, I do hope and pray that wherever you sit on the spectrum of belief, you will take a few moments to ponder this stunning, chaotic, exciting world, and the ever expanding realms of the universe beyond us, and consider how you fit in this vast picture.

Next time: Environmentalists are ratbags

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