A Christian Perspective on Environmental Stewardship – by Francis Schaeffer

Growing up in an Evangelical Christian home, my disappointment in how my form of Christianity thought about and responded to environmental problems was inescapable.  Biblical dominance over nature took precedence over reverence and respect.  But there was one prominent voice within the evangelical movement who strongly disagreed.  In 1970, Dr. Francis Schaeffer, an evangelical theologian and philosopher, penned the book, “Pollution and the Death of Man: the Christian view of ecology,” which is still available in reprinted version.  It’s a short read, little more than a hundred pages and a couple of hours of reading.  The other night I blew the dust off my original, dog-eared, margin-smudged version that I kept near my night-stand during my youth as I struggled with faith and fauna.  Its content and message of why Christian stewardship of the environment matters are still very relevant today.  Schaeffer wrote the book during a time of environmental awakening in the U.S., shortly after Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring but before the advent of federal environmental laws, such as the Clean Air and Water Acts.

Nature – an abstraction to far too many

Author and ecologist, Daniel Botkin, in his new book, The Moon in the Nautilus Shell, offers an important perspective on humanity’s connectedness to nature.  Using the fascinating ecology of the Nautilus, Botkin argues that we too are deeply connected to nature in ways beyond our own conciousness.  When we lose touch with our surroundings, nature becomes but a mere abstraction bereft of relevance and meaning. According to Botkin, the only way to solve many of our environmental problems is through our understanding of our connection to nature, an important part of ourselves.  Here is a four-minute video of the unique story of the Nautilus and Botkin’s sentiments.

Why All the Fuss About Tipping Points?

Central to concerns of climate change science is the somewhat ill-defined concept of “tipping point,” a point at which a system is irreversibly propelled into a different state of equilibrium.  What that means and what it looks like remain largely conjecture.  An interesting op-ed in last year’s NYT titled Searching for Clues to Calamity explores the concept.  The central question relative to climate change is at what atmospheric concentration does CO2 need to exist in order to force warming to such a point where, like a switch that is stuck in the “on” position, a domino effect will result in rapid glacial retreat, rising sea levels, ocean acidification, etc..  You get the gist.  Assuming there is such a tipping point (and that may be a big assumption for some), and we were to reach such a point, the earth would be a very different place according to many scientists. 

U.S. Remains a Science Superpower

Some good news for U.S. researchers and budding scientists.  Results of a new survey released today in Nature reveal the United States’ continued world dominance in science.

The United States remains the superpower of science, dominating a ranking of the world’s top 200 institutions in 2012, published today in the first Nature Publishing Index (NPI) Global supplement. The UK, Germany and Japan make up a solid top four countries in terms of high quality science output. China is nipping at France’s heels for the number five slot. The NPI ranks countries and institutions according to their output of primary research articles in the 18 Nature research journals in 2012, and includes data from 2008-2011 for comparison.

A Loss of Aesthetics in the Name of Greening

For you weekend warriors, before you go out and purchase “plastic wood” for that next deck project, you may want to think again if your motivation is being more sustainable.  An article in this week’s Nature by Jeff Tollefson titled ‘Plastic wood’ is no green guarantee, reveals that carbon emissions from plastic-wood manufacturing are 45-330% higher than redwood production, based on a study by the Consortium for Research on Renewable Industrial Materials, a public-private partnership based at the University of Washington.  Another article by Julia Pongratz, Plant a tree, but tend it well, reveals some potential limits of forests as carbon sinks from nutrient constraints.

Happy, Healthy Bugs Means Healthy Waters: continued strides to restore America’s waters

The following may be a wee bit granular for some of my readers, but hear me out, because this is a big deal in the context of improving national water quality.  According to EPA, nearly 50 percent of the Nation’s water bodies, i.e., lakes, streams, rivers, still do not meet water quality standards due to impairments from pollution.  One of the biggest offenders is excess nutrients as I’ve touched upon previously here (think harmful algal blooms).  Thus, EPA has been applying significant pressure on the States to adopt numeric nutrient criteria (as opposed to qualitative criteria), which in theory should make it easier and more effective to regulate nutrient pollution.  This has been a highly contentious issue, even going back to my time at EPA, as reflected in the recent Florida litigation.

EDF Promotes Sustainable Fracking Practices – and draws ire of other environmental groups

Environmental Defense Fund is taking heat from other environmental groups for promoting sustainable energy practices, as reported by Lenny Bernstein over at WaPo.

In an unusually public dispute, about 70 environmental groups Wednesday scolded one of their larger brethren, the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF), for joining with a group of energy companies that support hydraulic fracturing.

Global warming can be really really scary to kids . . .

A new survey reveals that nearly 60 percent of children fear global warming and the dire consequences, such as super storms, flooding, hurricanes, and tornadoes, even more than they fear terrorism, car crashes or cancer.  Consider the website, A Cooler Climate.Com, that lists the “10 Scary Facts” about global warming:  a rise in sea levels that will put cities under water, more frequent and severe hurricanes, more tornadoes, more infectious diseases including malaria and dengue fever in the U.S., and global famine and heat waves that will kill millions each year.  Global warming is even being linked to more wars, street violence and bloodshed.  And warming has prompted ice-curdling stories of glacial melting occurring so rapidly that Greenland will melt away by 2040, with sea levels rising by 23 feet.  Say good buy to next summer’s vacation on the Outer Banks – that rental is now being readied as a fishing reef.  Jeez louise, with all this fear-mongering going on . . . no wonder we’re over-medicating our kids.  I’m reaching for my Xanax now.

Night Heron on the Prowl

“A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, the stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”
―    Aldo Leopold

Another remarkable and highly accomplished wildlife artist, Richard Wear, from Canada, whose photography anyone would be so fortunate to have adorn their walls.  (Thank you, Richard, for allowing me to share your work with your neighbors to the south)  Can’t capture any better the stealth action and vivid colors of this Night Heron intent on its next meal.  Also nick-named the “Night Raven” for its evening prowess and crow-like vocalization, you’ll recognize this smallish heron when you see or hear it.

Nature’s Simple Beauties

“There are some who can live without wild things and some who cannot.” 
―    Aldo Leopold

Seek out and enjoy nature’s beauty and wild things around you.

Don Wagner’s wildlife and landscape photography – here he’s captured a wood duck drake. I don’t know Don, but I am blown away by his nature photography.  The serenity and composition is extraordinary and the wildlife he captures appears ready at a moment’s notice to jump from the canvas.

The Shadow of Human Existence

Linking to an article over at MercatorNet by Tracy Mehan, a friend and contemplative thinker on the human condition and the environment.  Mehan’s article, In a Natural State, reflecting upon David Botkins new book, The Moon in the Nautilus Shell: Discordant Harmonies Reconsidered, offers for consideration a new perspective on understanding the role of humanity in intervening and conserving the natural environment that is constantly changing.

“Nature in the twenty-first century will be a nature that we make; the question is the degree to which this molding will be intentional or unintentional, desirable or undesirable.” Botkin recognizes that abandoning the belief in the constancy of nature is very discomforting leaving us in “an extreme existential position.”

Mother Nature’s Resilience

Encouraging news out of Chernobyl 26 years after one of the worst nuclear power plant meltdowns.  Wildlife have moved back into the 1,100 square mile area largely abandoned since the accident.  Life after Chernobyl: Sergei Gaschak’s photography from inside ‘the zone’.  Images from hidden camera reveal how wildlife is thriving in zone closed off to humans for 26 years.  Long-term impacts to wildlife in the area, such as deformities, appear relatively scarce.  National Geographic (Returning to Abandoned Land) did a separate story on Chernobyl last year and reached similar conclusions.  Demonstrates the resilience of mother nature – although altogether best not to test nature’s resilience like this with such widespread human suffering and disruption.  Hundreds of thousands of families’ lives were shattered and tens of thousands sickened due to the Soviet Union central authorities’ incompetence, dangerous secrecy and cover-up.

The Universe – more than a cosmic sneeze?

In a January 4 speech to Washington University students, George Will offered some weighty thoughts on the role of government in ensuring the protection of natural rights.  I’ve excerpted some of the highlights below – a wonderfully scribed literary, philosophical and poetic piece well worth the read.  Will argues that nature is a reflection of norms that imbue natural rights that flow from an omniscient Creator who has endowed us with inalienable and universal rights that are antithetical to a smothering polity that seeks to supplant divine will with its own arrogance and ignorance.

When many people decide that the universe is merely the result of a cosmic sneeze, with no transcendent meaning; when they conclude that therefore life should be filled to overflowing with distractions – comforts and entertainments – to assuage the boredom; then they become susceptible to the excitements of politics promising ersatz meaning and spurious salvation from a human condition bereft of transcendence.