Archbishop Rowan Williams on "Renewing the Face of the Earth"

Renewing the Face of the Earth: Human Responsibility and the Environment
Wednesday 25 March 2009

The Archbishop gives a lecture at the Ebor Lecture, York Minster, to spell out why respect for the environment is not an optional extra, particularly for Christians. Dr Williams suggests that "we are capable of changing our situation"; in "Christian terms, this needs a radical change of heart, a conversion." The Ebor Lectures are a series of lectures which aim to relate faith to public concerns.

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Read the entire lecture HERE

Some modern philosophers have spoken about the human face as the most potent sign of what it is that we can't master or exhaust in the life of a human other – a sign of the claim upon us of the other, the depths we can't sound but must respect. And while it is of course so ancient a metaphor to talk about the 'face' of the earth that we barely notice any longer that it is a metaphor, it does no harm to let some of these associations find their way into our thinking; because such associations resonate so strongly with a fundamental biblical insight into the nature of our relationship with the world we inhabit. 'The earth is the Lord's', says the twenty fourth psalm. In its context, this is primarily an assertion of God's glory and overall sovereignty. And it affirms a relation between God and the world that is independent of what we as human beings think about the world or do to the world. The world is in the hands of another. The earth we inhabit is more than we can get hold of in any one moment or even in the sum total of all the moments we spend with it. Its destiny is not bound only to human destiny, its story is not exhausted by the history of our particular culture or technology, or even by the history of the entire human race. We can't as humans oblige the environment to follow our agenda in all things, however much we can bend certain natural forces to our will; we can't control the weather system or the succession of the seasons. The world turns, and the tides move at the drawing of the moon. Human force is incapable of changing any of this. What is before me is a network of relations and interconnections in which the relation to me, or even to us collectively as human beings, is very far from the whole story. I may ignore this, but only at the cost of disaster. And it would be dangerously illusory to imagine that this material environment will adjust itself at all costs so as to maintain our relationship to it. If it is more than us and our relation with it, it can survive us; we are dispensable. But the earth remains the Lord's.

Read the entire lecture HERE

And, remember his video from New Year's, 2008 "Care for the environment teaches us about God" ... click HERE

Lent - Could this be a season to reduce our use of planetary resources? Check out "No Impact Man"

From the "No Impact Man" blog...

I used to wonder: What does it matter if I choose to use planetary resources more carefully? Can I really make a difference?

I might also have asked: What does it matter if I choose to show up at a rally to advocate for clean energy and end to coal burning? I will be one of thousands who may make no difference to the political process, at least that's what the pessimist in me used to want to say.

But then I learned that the first question is not whether or not I can make a difference. The first question is whether I want to be the kind of person who tries. And that's where the power lies: if I don't believe I make a difference then I won't even try and I can't. But I do believe I can. And trying has taught me that we all make a difference.

We all make a difference. This is our world and our life. We just have to live as though that is true to make it true.

That's why, on Monday, I joined thousands of others at the Capitol Climate Action, a protest against a coal-burning planet in the middle of DC. It's a symbol--a coal-burning plant that powers the United States Capitol at a time when we need to move away from coal rapidly.

And it's not just about climate. The local city councilor stood up and told us that 14 percent of the area's children suffer from asthma, thanks partly to the power plant.

So I stood in the freezing cold, in the snow, with leaky shoes, and felt proud of the bunch of other people who had shown up because they wanted to be the type of people who try. When thousands of people care enough to take the time and stand in the cold, doesn't that make a difference to you?

Read more about the action here and here and here.

Earth Day: Top Green Websites & Blogs

Check out the Time.com (Time Magazine) article HERE.

The top 15 Green Websites are:

1. Grist
2. TreeHugger
3. Dot Earth
4. Climate Change
5. RealClimate
6. Environmental Capital
7. No Impact Man
8. EcoGeek
9. Ecorazzi
10. Switchboard
11. Mongabay
12. Climate Ethics
13. Climate Progress
14. World Changing
15. Planet Ark

Hat tip to "No Impact Man" and congrats to him on his #7 spot on the list!!!

Dalai Lama on limit-setting ...

Back in the fall of 1990, the Dalai Lama visited my hometown, Middlebury, Vermont, for a symposium on "Spirit and Nature," which featured leaders and scholars from Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, and Muslim world views. The question of how religion and spirituality might aid (or block) an environmental ethic was an important one then, and (it could be argued) the issue is even more important today. I had the pleasure of going to all the sessions, while on a break from my senior year in college. There is a book that was produced with transcripts from all the presentations and there is also a video that was produced by Bill Moyers by the same name, "Spirit and Nature."

I was excited to find this short clip (1 minute) on YouTube of an interchange between Moyers and the Dalai Lama about where reverence for the environment (in this case a mosquito) might have boundaries. What I find most wonderful about this interchange is not only the Dalai Lama's rich practice of his 'belief,' but also his wonderful spirit of humor, lightness, and playfulness ... check it out HERE. (Oh, and whoever loaded it on YouTube called it "the Dalai Lama kills a mosquito," however, it seems that isn't quite accurate...but I don't want to spoil the punchline...)

Do check it out; priceless.