Post by Watchman on Feb 8, 2007 13:06:39 GMT -5
Professing themselves to be wise, they became fools, and changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things. Wherefore God also gave them up to uncleanness through the lusts of their own hearts, to dishonour their own bodies between themselves: who changed the truth of God into a lie, and worshipped and served the creature more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen. Romans 1:22-25
{Watchman}
David Cox
February 8, 2007 11:55 AM
commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/david_cox/2007/02/earth_worship_is_sustaining_gl.html
Nowadays, some of those unable to acknowledge a creator seem eager to make a cult of creation instead. This should not surprise us. Earth worship, rather than deference to personal gods, is arguably humanity's default religion.
The Earth, after all, requires no act of faith to validate its existence. The generosity with which it bestows life and livelihood, the awesome wrath with which it inflicts flood and famine, and indeed its control over our destiny, all brook no denial. What's not to worship? What's not to love, fear and propitiate?
Thus it is that guilty obeisance to our planet's monstrous power has become part of the human condition. Many of our predecessors feared environmental disaster on some looming doomsday. Usually, they saw the coming catastrophe as divine vengeance for their own sinful rapacity. Often, they believed that only repentance and sacrifice could save them from the just vengeance of an angry Earth.
Today's global warming zealots have neatly appropriated this enduring scriptural apologue. Those of them who have embraced the Gaia thesis are able to revere an almost living planet. And now, the timeless appeal of their narrative is attracting the devotees of conventional creeds, some of whom are trying to align their own theologies with the foxy faith of the hour. For example, in a forthcoming TV show, the former Dominican friar Mark Dowd aims to show that the religions of the book have goofed: all that stuff about humans having dominion over the Earth is entirely the wrong way round.
Certainly, the climate-change crusade offers the religiose most of the trappings for which they hunger. It has plenty of staring-eyed prophets like George Monbiot, as well as peripatetic evangelists like Al Gore. The dull glare of its low-energy lightbulbs stands in for candlelight, while the IPCC will do as its synod of bishops. Its wind turbines, standing as high above the waves as a football pitch is long, match medieval cathedrals in both their grandeur and their inutility.
Even more enticingly, it offers its disciples reassuring rituals, such as the nightly switch-off of the standby button and the occasional storming of an airport lounge. Sacrificial scourging is available in the form of rainy UK holidaymaking, together with opportunities for penitential mortification ranging from insulating the loft to traipsing round farmers' markets. Sacraments, such as pledging a flightless future, provide that inner glow of recognised righteousness.
What's wrong with all this, you may well ask: environmental sanctity clearly provides harmless succour to those in need of it. Moreover, surely, it might save the human race from extinction. Here, however, is the rub. The religion that global warming has spawned has become an obstacle to the cause it appears to enshrine.
The trouble with religions is that their adherents' prime concern tends to be securing their own position among the elect. Often they feel that pursuing personal salvation by faith and works is all that is required. Thus, our new environmentalist congregation is happy to chant dogma, make (some) sacrifices in its name and denounce 4x4 drivers and long-haul travellers. Unfortunately, this will not be enough to defeat global warming.
It is not just that the sacrifices of the brethren are often ineffective gestures. Nor is it that the Pharisees among them, like Prince Charles, can barely manage gestures. The real problem is that no amount of action on the part of a committed minority will ever do the trick.
Most of the world's infidels will never convert to the faith. Anathematising them may warm the hearts of the faithful, but it will not change the miscreants' pagan ways. The only thing that could achieve this is a far-reaching programme of compulsion. And that could be engineered only by the world's governments.
At present, these governments have yet to rise to this challenge on anything like a sufficient scale. It may be that they never will. However, if they are to be prodded into taking the necessary measures, more will be required than the piety of a sanctimonious few. It will take relentless political action.
Sadly, politics enjoys none of the charisma that once more attends religion. On the contrary, its machinations are everywhere abominated. These days, those concerned with self-image and social standing want nothing to do with the wearisome and unlovely grind that constitutes political activism.
It is therefore understandable that professed champions of the atmosphere should avoid humdrum agitprop, and opt instead for a combination of modest self-chastisement and preening self-righteousness. Yet, by putting piety before politics, they doom their cause.
Earth worship may make the worshippers feel better. The Earth, however, needs something more.
{Watchman}
David Cox
February 8, 2007 11:55 AM
commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/david_cox/2007/02/earth_worship_is_sustaining_gl.html
Nowadays, some of those unable to acknowledge a creator seem eager to make a cult of creation instead. This should not surprise us. Earth worship, rather than deference to personal gods, is arguably humanity's default religion.
The Earth, after all, requires no act of faith to validate its existence. The generosity with which it bestows life and livelihood, the awesome wrath with which it inflicts flood and famine, and indeed its control over our destiny, all brook no denial. What's not to worship? What's not to love, fear and propitiate?
Thus it is that guilty obeisance to our planet's monstrous power has become part of the human condition. Many of our predecessors feared environmental disaster on some looming doomsday. Usually, they saw the coming catastrophe as divine vengeance for their own sinful rapacity. Often, they believed that only repentance and sacrifice could save them from the just vengeance of an angry Earth.
Today's global warming zealots have neatly appropriated this enduring scriptural apologue. Those of them who have embraced the Gaia thesis are able to revere an almost living planet. And now, the timeless appeal of their narrative is attracting the devotees of conventional creeds, some of whom are trying to align their own theologies with the foxy faith of the hour. For example, in a forthcoming TV show, the former Dominican friar Mark Dowd aims to show that the religions of the book have goofed: all that stuff about humans having dominion over the Earth is entirely the wrong way round.
Certainly, the climate-change crusade offers the religiose most of the trappings for which they hunger. It has plenty of staring-eyed prophets like George Monbiot, as well as peripatetic evangelists like Al Gore. The dull glare of its low-energy lightbulbs stands in for candlelight, while the IPCC will do as its synod of bishops. Its wind turbines, standing as high above the waves as a football pitch is long, match medieval cathedrals in both their grandeur and their inutility.
Even more enticingly, it offers its disciples reassuring rituals, such as the nightly switch-off of the standby button and the occasional storming of an airport lounge. Sacrificial scourging is available in the form of rainy UK holidaymaking, together with opportunities for penitential mortification ranging from insulating the loft to traipsing round farmers' markets. Sacraments, such as pledging a flightless future, provide that inner glow of recognised righteousness.
What's wrong with all this, you may well ask: environmental sanctity clearly provides harmless succour to those in need of it. Moreover, surely, it might save the human race from extinction. Here, however, is the rub. The religion that global warming has spawned has become an obstacle to the cause it appears to enshrine.
The trouble with religions is that their adherents' prime concern tends to be securing their own position among the elect. Often they feel that pursuing personal salvation by faith and works is all that is required. Thus, our new environmentalist congregation is happy to chant dogma, make (some) sacrifices in its name and denounce 4x4 drivers and long-haul travellers. Unfortunately, this will not be enough to defeat global warming.
It is not just that the sacrifices of the brethren are often ineffective gestures. Nor is it that the Pharisees among them, like Prince Charles, can barely manage gestures. The real problem is that no amount of action on the part of a committed minority will ever do the trick.
Most of the world's infidels will never convert to the faith. Anathematising them may warm the hearts of the faithful, but it will not change the miscreants' pagan ways. The only thing that could achieve this is a far-reaching programme of compulsion. And that could be engineered only by the world's governments.
At present, these governments have yet to rise to this challenge on anything like a sufficient scale. It may be that they never will. However, if they are to be prodded into taking the necessary measures, more will be required than the piety of a sanctimonious few. It will take relentless political action.
Sadly, politics enjoys none of the charisma that once more attends religion. On the contrary, its machinations are everywhere abominated. These days, those concerned with self-image and social standing want nothing to do with the wearisome and unlovely grind that constitutes political activism.
It is therefore understandable that professed champions of the atmosphere should avoid humdrum agitprop, and opt instead for a combination of modest self-chastisement and preening self-righteousness. Yet, by putting piety before politics, they doom their cause.
Earth worship may make the worshippers feel better. The Earth, however, needs something more.