Green Movement Turns To God To Advance Cause

Gary Gardner, director of research at the environmental group, Worldwatch Institute, helped coordinate a meeting between environmental and religious groups last week in Washington, D.C.

"I think there is a real opportunity to advance the cause of sustainable development by having the environmental community and people of faith work together on issues of common concern," Gardner told CNSNews.com. In a separate statement on the issue, Gardner said the collaboration between environmental and religious groups "could change the world."

"It's a powerful combination that until recently remained virtually unexplored," Gardner stated.

The Worldwatch Institute released its new study detailing how religious groups worldwide are pushing green causes.

The report, "Invoking the Spirit: Religion and Spirituality in the Quest for a Sustainable World," states that environmentalists "have become more aware of the power of spirituality in creating an emotional connection between people and nature."

Jeramy Shays, director of Seminars for the Environmental Law Institute, said she is "very excited about the connection of faith and environment."

"Our consumption in this country is embarrassing. I think it hurts us internationally. I just think it's wrong," Shays explained.

"When you express moderation, reduce pollution and when you don't waste, you are doing unto everyone else what you would want them doing unto you," she said.

Gardner believes religion's emphasis on "self restraint" will help promote the environmentalists' message of limiting consumption.

"[Self restraint] is one big thing that faiths have to offer to a consumer culture," Gardner said. "It is not in our own best interests nor in our interests as a society for all of us to be highly consumptive individuals. There is a real virtue to restraint."

Douglas Grace of the National Religious Partnership for the Environment said the merging of religion and environmental causes is only in its infancy.

"Religion and religious people are beginning to see the connections between the created order and the human's placements and the responsibility that we have," Grace said.

Caring for the environment "goes back to the beginning in [the biblical book of] Genesis when God created the world and put Adam and Eve in the garden and told them to take care of it, to be stewards of creation," he added.

Julie Greene of the National Council for Science and the Environment said, "Faith and the environment are intimately connected."

"It should not be viewed as pushing a religion, but rather the religious groups reaching out to other members of their community to push environmental protection," Greene said.

Many of the participants praised the recent anti-SUV campaign called, "What Would Jesus Drive?" They said they had no doubt Jesus would choose an earth-friendly mode of transportation.

"I think Jesus would have driven the most fuel efficient vehicle he could find ... he would want to use the most environmentally friendly vehicle that is going to protect his father's world," said Grace.

Grace's group, the National Religious Partnership for the Environment, was one of the sponsors of the recent anti-SUV campaign invoking the name of Jesus.

"It's an interesting question, how would Jesus evaluate a transportation option, what criteria would he use? How would Jesus or any other religious leader view their responsibly to the environment?" Gardner asked.

"SUVs don't get great gas mileage, contribute to accumulation of carbon in the atmosphere and eventually lead to global warming, climate change," he said.

Chris Horner, a senior fellow at the free-market environmental think tank Competitive Enterprise Institute, found it ironic that the greens would attempt to merge forces with religious groups.

"There's nothing like the political Left dropping, on a dime, their objection to attempts by the [religious] faithful to impose their values on others through the political process," Horner told CNSNews.com.

"It is a shameless gimmick to ask, in reality, 'What Would Jesus Drive, if I were Jesus? It is arrogant for people to assume what Jesus would drive," Horner said.

Noting that the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) found the lighter the car, the higher the fatality rate, Horner commented that Jesus would "take into account the safety of his people" in choosing a vehicle.

"If [environmentalists] were concerned at all about people, they would consider that even the NAS has cited that current [federal] CAFE (Corporate Average Fuel Economy) standards cost up to 2,400 lives per year," Horner said, noting that higher fuel economy requirements typically mean cars get lighter and therefore more deadly.

Jeramy Shays, director of Seminars for the Environmental Law Institute, said she is "very excited about the connection of faith and environment."

"Our consumption in this country is embarrassing. I think it hurts us internationally. I just think it's wrong," Shays explained.

Shays added that the intersection of faith and ecology is natural.

"When you express moderation, reduce pollution and when you don't waste, you are doing unto everyone else what you would want them doing unto you," she said.

Many of us personally experienced the moderation and reduction of pollution during the forest fires this past spring, summer and fall. It was just Heavenly watching those trees burn and the smoke rising into the sky, spreading out across the lands for all to enjoy. Oh, Jeramy Shays, I thank you for your wisdom in sharing the glorious wasteful destruction of our forests with God and the people of America. I will pray that we may have the same wonderful religous experience next spring, next summer and next fall.

I will pray that you are totally surrounded by the burning trees during the next large forest fire we have, so that you may have a firsthand experience at seeing what you are doing to God's lands in America.

"It's a powerful combination that until recently remained virtually unexplored," Gardner stated.

This guy is a liar. He knows full well about the NRPE.

From the eco-logic web site (requires membership to see this document):

The Rise of Global Green Religion
© 1996 Environmental Conservation Organization

The National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE) announced its $5 million program on October 4, 1993, at the Mount Gilead Baptist Church in Washington, DC, "to underscore the connection between addressing issues of poverty and the environment." The Partnership is a formal agreement among four of the nation's largest religious organizations:

U.S. Catholic Conference
National Council of Churches of Christ
Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life
Evangelical Environmental Network.

Although not a full partner, the Union of Concerned Scientists is identified in a special "consultative" relationship, and the NRPE has established an office in their headquarters.
The NRPE is presently engaged in mailing "education and action kits" to 67,300 religious congregations which ultimately reaches 100-million church-goers. Paul Gorman, Executive Director of the Partnership, says: "...how people of faith engage the environmental crisis will have much to do with the future well-being of the planet, and in all likelihood, with the future of religious life as well."⁽²⁾
Gorman's comment may prove to be the understatement of the century. The objectives of the NRPE are nothing less than the transformation of social order into a global society organized around the notion that the earth itself is the giver of life, and that all the world's religions are evolving into a state of enlightenment that recognizes Gaia as the true source of life and spirituality, and is the only relevant object of worship. In order to fully appreciate the scope and significance of the NRPE, it is necessary to examine its origin, trace its development, and explore the motivation and philosophy of the individuals who brought the idea to fruition.

In the beginning...

The Temple of Understanding, housed at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, was founded in 1960 by Juliet Hollister and a prestigious group of "Founding Friends" which included: H.H. the XIV Dalai Lama, Jawaharlal Nehru, H.H. Pope John XXIII, Eleanor Roosevelt, Anwar el-Sadat, Dr. Albert Schweitzer, UN Secretary-General U Thant, and others. The Temple developed a series of "Spiritual Summit Conferences" that met in Calcutta (1968), Geneva (1970), Harvard and Princeton Universities (1971), Cornell University (1974) and at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City (1984). The Temple also convened a conference on Mount Sinai in October of 1984 to "thrash out an inter-religious consensus," for which Dr. Robert Muller, Assistant UN Secretary-General, and author of New Genesis, was asked to draft a "Declaration of the Unity of World Religions." In 1988, the Temple co-founded the "Global Forum of Spiritual and Parliamentary Leaders for Human Survival," an unprecedented event sponsored jointly with the UN Global Committee of Parliamentarians on Population and Development. The Forum met in Oxford, England in 1988, and again in Moscow in 1990. The Temple was also instrumental in creating the "North American Interfaith Network" which held international conferences in Wichita in 1987 and in Seattle in 1990.
The UN Global Committee of Parliamentarians on Population and Development was created in 1982 with funding support from the UN Population Fund, and a special trust fund established by the UN Development Program "to provide information on global survival issues to parliamentarians, spiritual leaders and the media, and to fund network meetings at national, regional and global levels." It is significant that twelve individuals listed on the Board of Directors or Advisors of the Temple of Understanding are also listed as members of the Global Forum Council, including the Very Reverend James Parks Morton who is Dean of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, President of the Temple of Understanding, and co-chair of the Global Forum Council.
The featured speaker at the 1988 Forum in Oxford, England was James Lovelock, author of The Ages of Gaia. He told the audience: "On Earth, she [Gaia] is the source of life everlasting and is alive now; she gave birth to humankind and we are a part of her." Lovelock's gaia hypothesis first appeared in 1979 and evolved into Gaia: A New Look At Life On Earth, published by Oxford Press in 1982. The gaia hypothesis contends that the earth itself is a living organism, the source of all life, and which has the capacity to regulate, or "heal" itself under "natural" conditions. Lovelock's contention is that the human species has developed the technology to overwhelm gaia's capacity to "heal" itself, and is therefore doomed to destruction unless the human species stops its technological assault. He told the Forum that global warming is the result of the human assault on the earth, and likened it to a fever in humans, but is worried that humans are not allowing gaia to recuperate. He said: "She may be unable to relax because we have been busy removing her skin and using it as farm land, especially the trees and forests of the humid tropics...we are also adding a vast blanket of greenhouse gases to the already feverish patient."

"Virtually unexplored" my ass.

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