[asa] Environmental Alarmists Have It Backwards

For those interested, my post is
here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1823164/posts?page=22#22

Environmental Alarmists Have It Backwards
April 25, 2007
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1823164/posts [refresh browser]

~ Janice .. who wonders if she will ever get an
answer to her question of yesterday, to wit:
Date: Tue, 24 Apr 2007 13:14:44 To: Don Nield -
(or George Murphy, et.al.) From: Janice
Matchett - Subject: Re: [asa] a thought for
earth day (tomorrow) Cc: <asa@calvin.edu>

@ Do I correctly understand you and those you
admire to be saying that we can "murder" the
earth? Do we also "murder" animals rather than "kill" them?

~ Janice ... http://www.onecosmos.blogspot.com/

At 05:32 PM 4/23/2007, Don Nield wrote:
>To supplement what Ted and George have said, I
>mention a very useful book that I have reviewed
>in the latest issue of PSCF. Two extracts
>(unedited) from my review follow. I will be
>happy to send my full review privately on request.
>*********************************
>
>ENVIRONMENTAL STEWARDSHIP: Critical
>Perspectives- Past and Present, by R. J. Berry
>(ed.), New York, NY ,T & T Clark International,
>2006, 338 pages, index. Paperback; $49.50, ISBN 0567030180
>
>This book contains 26 essays and an introduction
>by Berry, who is a Professor Emeritus of
>Genetics at University College, London. The core
>essays are updates of papers, from a 2000
>conference to explore “the Christian approach to
>the environment” at Windsor Castle organized by
>the John Ray Initiative, by Robin Attfield
>(philosopher), Murray Rae (theologian), Calvin
>DeWitt (environmental biologist) and James
>Lovelock (biogeochemist). These are supplemented
>by classical expositions/criticisms by Richard
>Bauckham, John Black, Anne Clifford, René Dubos,
>Douglas Hall, Peter Harrison, Ruth Page, Clare
>Palmer, Larry Rasmussen, Paul Santmire, Lisa
>Sideris, Joseph Sittler, and John Zizioulas,
>plus papers written especially for this
>collection by Elving Anderson and Bruce
>Reichenbach, Susan Bratton, Martin Holdgate,
>John Houghton, Michael Northcott, Derek Osborn
>and Chris Southgate, plus previously unpublished
>lectures by Chris Patten and Crispin Tickell.
>
>************************************
>
>Santmire contrasts the creation theology in the
>priestly and Yahwist stories, and then that in
>the Book of Job. He says that the Yahwist story,
>with its small-scale agrarian setting,
>exemplifies what sensitive care for the earth
>can mean. In this theological drama the land is
>a character in its own right. The human’s
>relationship to the animals is depicted in terms
>of tangible solidarity rather than intervention.
>Santmire notes that in the Bible there is no
>doctrine of ‘cosmic fall’. The soil remains
>innocent; the divine curse rests on it because
>of the disobedience of humans and because of the
>fruits of violence that grow from that
>disobedience. The promise is that, in Christ,
>with the deep human fault healed and the curse
>therefore removed, we humans can begin to live
>in Eden again. In contrast, in Job we are led
>into the experience of a wilderness. We see
>noble wild creatures nurtured by God, celebrated
>precisely because they resist human
>domestication. No longer is conquering and
>controlling nature part of the equation for
>discerning human dignity. We have a complex and
>rich biblical theology of partnership between
>God, humans and all other creatures.
>*************************************
>
>Don Nield

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Received on Wed Apr 25 09:13:41 2007