What The Bible Says Good Samaritan's Penny Pulpit by Pastor Ed Rice

What The Bible Says Good Samaritan's Penny Pulpit by Pastor Ed Rice

What The Bible Says Good Samaritan's Penny Pulpit by Pastor Ed Rice

Do activists often invest their work with religious significance? All the more reason for Christians to be discerning co-laborers.I love nature documentaries, especially those narrated by David Attenborough. Whether watching with my children or on my own, I love seeing the majesty of the snowy Alps or kelp forests.But I’ve noticed that in recent years, nearly every somber vignette of a species struggling on the edge of survival ends with a call to action. Viewers are beckoned to take responsibility for causing a poor animal’s plight and to consider how they can fix things before the species is gone forever.I understand the impulse to believe that animals’ struggles should move humans to action. However, it is the ethics informing the narrator’s pleas that seem a bit muddled.By many documentarians’ admission, the species we marvel at on screen have emerged out of eons of struggles to survive and adapt to their surroundings. Sometimes, the narrators even remind us that this process has resulted in countless prior species disappearing into extinction.Whether you believe in a young or an old earth, in God’s hand or in meaningless physical forces guiding history, we can all agree that change, death, and selection favoring adaptability are features of life on earth. Witnessing it in real time makes for compelling television drama, but the moral indictment that you and I contribute to grave evil when one of these species goes extinct does not seem to square with the documentarians’ worldview.What compels us to see polar bears possibly going extinct in terms of moral right and wrong? If we take human action out of the equation, isn’t history littered with the bones of countless species that have gone extinct? Are not humans and their actions part of nature?A robust theology of creation careIf we listen closely, ...Continue reading...

I grew up as a climate change denier. Now I understand we must care for God's creation and people alike.I grew up believing that Earth Day was a liberal holiday. Climate change was a lie, a ploy by leftist political activists to dismantle US economic superiority by undermining domestic energy production and crippling our industries. Humans had a God-given right to have “dominion” (Gen. 1:26) over the earth, I was taught. The natural world was ours to “steward” (Gen. 2:15), which to us meant it could be used as desired to improve the lives of industrious, hard-working families like ours.Everywhere I turned, I saw this definition of stewardship in action. It was well-intended but, I now think, ill-considered. My home then was the Texas Panhandle, atop the Ogallala Aquifer. The Ogallala is the largest aquifer in the nation, but after decades of High Plains farmers tapping it with abandon, it’s drying up.These days, I live five hours south of my hometown atop another major geological formation: the Permian Basin, the nation’s most productive oil field and the heart of the US oil and gas industry. Thirteen years ago, I cried when we moved to Midland, Texas, for my husband’s new job with a natural gas company, not wanting my family to be part of an industry I’d come to believe was destroying the earth. Needless to say, by then, I no longer believed climate change was a lie.I’d spent nearly four years in a small village outside of Beijing where the drainage creek bubbled with dangerously toxic sludge; we’d go days without seeing the sun through the industrial haze; and blowing my nose in the winter would leave me with a tissue blackened with coal dust. I didn’t have to be a climate scientist to conclude that there would be consequences for ...Continue reading...

Christian artists work at the intersection of music and climate change. Christians love to sing about creation. Hymns like “How Great Thou Art” describe the beauty of creation that moves the church to sing, “I see the stars, I hear the rolling thunder / Thy power throughout the universe displayed.”Nature can also be a source of confusion or anxiety for believers as they observe eclipses and earthquakes and try to discern God’s role or intent in their unfolding. And as climate change more visibly impacts humans, the natural world can seem increasingly hostile, even as it remains a source of inspiration and joy for the Christian.Where is God’s hand at work? And how should we respond to mysteries and chaos in our prayers and worship?British scholar Mark Porter believes the Christian imagination can hold a complex view of creation—as can music. His research looks at the intersection of music, faith, and climate change, showing ways to engage nature beyond using it as a signpost of God’s glory, contending also with its beauty, chaos, fragility, and brutality.“There’s not just one thing that nature imagery does,” said Porter. “It can do something besides inspire an individual to look to God in worship.”Porter’s forthcoming book For the Warming of the Earth: Music, Faith, and Ecological Crisis describes how faith communities and organizations are responding to climate change and environmental crises with music, such as Resound Worship’s Doxecology album, the activism of groups like Christian Climate Action (CCA), and Catholic song festivals centered on Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical, Laudato Si’.It’s not a how-to book for worship leaders looking to more explicitly address creation care or ...Continue reading...

Authored by Suzanne Gasparatto via The Epoch Times Humans cannot live without water, yet many of us take for granted that water is readily available....Water In Texas: A Window Into Problems Across The US

Authored by Suzanne Gasparatto via The Epoch Times Humans cannot live without water, yet many of us take for granted that water is readily available....Water In Texas: A Window Into Problems Across The US