Environmentalism

In a remarkable fusion of art and science, researchers have unveiled Anauchen picasso, a newly discovered microsnail species from Southeast Asia, named in honor of the iconic artist Pablo Picasso. This tiny creature, measuring less than 5 millimeters, boasts a uniquely angular shell that evokes the geometric forms of Cubist art. The team described it as resembling "a cubist interpretation of other snails with 'normal' shell shapes."

This species is one of 46 newly documented microsnails found in Southeast Asia. One researcher wrote, “Although the shell sizes of these snails are less than 5 mm, they are real beauties! Their shells exhibit extraordinary complexity.”

The complexity is not merely aesthetic. The snail has an aperture lined with tooth-like barriers, likely serving as defense against predators. Even more unusually, some of the snails carry their shells with the opening turned either upward or downward—creating an “upside-down” orientation. These details, including the shape and orientation of the final shell whorl, were key to distinguishing between species.

Some of the species were found in recent fieldwork, while others had been overlooked in museum archives for decades, collected all the way in the 1980s. Tragically, many of the snail habitats may no longer exist due to widespread deforestation and limestone quarrying in the region—two major threats to these endemic creatures.

The naming of Anauchen picasso not only pays tribute to artistic innovation but also underscores the intricate beauty and diversity found in nature's smallest creations. This discovery highlights the intersection of art, science, and conservation, reminding us that even the tiniest organisms can inspire awe and appreciation.

Potential Preaching Angles:

When we pay close attention to God’s creation, we can rediscover wonder and joy. God is the master artist, and continually displays His glory through the details of His creation.

Many zoos are facing a new dilemma: gorillas and screen time. Great apes have become interested in watching videos of themselves on the phones of visitors.

For instance, in San Diego, four hulking male gorillas roamed their zoo enclosure, sitting pensively on rocks overlooking a waterfall and climbing a wooden structure. Suddenly, an 18-year-old western lowland gorilla named Ekuba bounded up to the glass. The 380-pound animal looked expectantly at a man wearing a shirt bearing the gorilla’s image as he pulled out his phone. Ekuba stood on all fours and began watching videos—of himself and other gorillas.

Ekuba isn’t the only gorilla enthralled with devices. Across North America, zoos have grappled with, and sometimes embraced, primates taking an interest in screen time. In Louisville, Ky., a 27-year-old gorilla named Jelani has been enamored with phones for years, flicking his finger or tapping the glass when he’s ready for a visitor to swipe to the next shot. At the Toronto Zoo, keepers have hung signs to dissuade showing screens to gorillas, citing disruption to their family dynamic.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Creation; Responsibility; Stewardship - The Bible teaches that humans are given dominion over animals, but this comes with a responsibility for their well-being. This story can serve as an example of the proverb “Monkey see, monkey do" which reminds us that our actions can influence those around us, even animals who are keen observers, and they often replicate both positive and negative actions they observe in their environment.

Since 1953, when Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit, over 4,000 people have successfully climbed Mount Everest. Unfortunately, the climbers have also littered the mountainside with garbage, such as used oxygen bottles, ropes, and tents. Today, Everest is so overcrowded and full of trash that it has been called the “world’s highest garbage dump.”

No one knows exactly how much waste is on the mountain, but it is in the tons. Litter is spilling out of glaciers, and camps are overflowing with piles of human waste. Climate change is causing snow and ice to melt, exposing even more garbage that has been covered for decades. All that waste is trashing the natural environment, and it poses a serious health risk to everyone who lives in the Everest watershed.

Both governments and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) have attempted—and are attempting—to clean up the mess on Mount Everest. In 2019, the Nepali government launched a campaign to clear 10,000 kilograms (22,000 pounds) of trash from the mountain. They also started a deposit initiative. Anyone visiting Mount Everest has to pay a $4,000 deposit, and the money is refunded if the person returns with eight kilograms (18 pounds) of garbage—the average amount that a single person produces during the climb.

Possible Preaching Angle:

1) Legacy - We should all pause for a moment and think, “In my climb up the ladder of success, what am I leaving behind? Will others have to pick through my "garbage"?2) Sinfulness; Cleansing – We all have a filthy old nature which is desperately in need of the deep cleaning and spiritual renewal that only God’s Spirit can perform. “He saved us by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit” (Titus 3:5).

The San Diego City Council has unanimously voted to restrict public access to Point La Jolla and Boomer Beach, a popular sea lion rookery, in an effort to protect the marine mammals from harassment. The decision follows increasing incidents of visitors crossing barriers and engaging in risky behavior with the sea lions.

Phillip Musegaas, the executive director for the San Diego Coastkeeper, highlighted the potential dangers of human-sea lion interactions, particularly during the pupping season. According to him, such interactions can lead to aggressive behavior from the sea lions or the abandonment of their young. The Council's decision aims to maintain a balance between public access and wildlife protection, allowing recreational ocean activities while preventing disturbances to the sea lions like petting or posing for photos.

City Council member Joe LaCava stressed the significance of preserving the unique coastal experience for visitors while safeguarding the natural environment. The decision to restrict access is not only aimed at protecting the sea lions but also ensuring the safety of visitors. With concerns about the rocky terrain and the potential risks of falling, the commission aims to prevent accidents. With the new mandate empowering rangers to enforce violations, there is a collective recognition of the need to protect both the sea lions and visitors alike.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Creation; Stewardship; Environmentalism — The God of the universe has given us the great task of caring for our planet. We have an operating manual for our planet right in front of us in the Bible, and we must allow that manual to change our thinking and behavior. How are we taking care of the earth that God put in our care?

Climate anxiety and environmental destruction have been added to the list of apocalyptic fears. Nuclear war is now no longer our only worry. A large group of philosophers and scientists in many fields are now proposing that our time on Earth should come to an end. What was once considered good—steady population growth, decline in global poverty, and rapid progress in health science and medicine—should now be looked at in a completely different light. According to an article in The Atlantic:

The Bible gives the negative commandment “Thou shalt not kill” as well as the positive commandment “Be fruitful and multiply,” and traditionally they have gone together. But if being fruitful and multiplying starts to be seen as itself a form of killing, because it deprives future generations and other species of irreplaceable resources, then the flourishing of humanity can no longer be seen as simply good. Instead, it becomes part of a zero-sum competition that pits the gratification of human desires against the well-being of all of nature—not just animals and plants, but soil, stones, and water.

If that’s the case, then humanity can no longer be considered a part of creation or nature, as science and religion teach in their different ways. Instead, it must be seen as an antinatural force that has usurped and abolished nature, substituting its own will for the processes that once appeared to be the immutable basis of life on Earth. This understanding of humanity’s place outside and against the natural order is summed up in the term “Anthropocene,” which in the past decade has become one of the most important concepts in the humanities and social sciences. ... It is a rejection of humanity’s traditional role as Earth’s protagonist, the most important being in creation.

In Thailand, government officials have set in motion an unusual plan to curb littering in the nation’s Khao Yai National Park. Environment minister Silpa-archa announced on Facebook he intended to send the trash to the homes of tourists who litter in the park. Silpa-­archa warned in the post, “Your trash—we’ll send it back to you.”

Officials say they have already boxed up and returned litter to one group of campers by mail. Littering in the park is also punishable by up to five years behind bars.

Possible Preaching Angle:

What happens in Thailand, doesn’t stay in Thailand! As Scripture says, “You may be sure your sin will find you out” (Num. 32:23)

A recent Angus Reid poll asked 1,528 Canadians for their moral perspectives on a wide variety of issues. Among the findings: while 51% thought that using plastic straws is always or usually morally wrong, only 20% thought the same of “doctor-assisted dying” and just 26% for abortion.

(People) are rejecting God’s Law and … are creating their own substitutes in an attempt to justify themselves (Jer. 2:13-14. Luke 18:9-14). Sure, I may have just had my elderly mother euthanized, and had my unborn baby aborted, but I’m a good person because I always use a bamboo, not plastic, straw. I’m doing my part!

Possible Preaching Angle:

The lawless trend this poll reveals provides Christians with an opportunity to contrast the sandy foundation of the world’s moral code with the Solid Rock (Matt. 7:24-27, Ps. 18:2). God’s Law versus the world’s morals--has the contrast ever been clearer? Let’s take full advantage of this time and opportunity given to us to bring many to him.

A bus driver became greatly irritated whenever he parked his bus at the parking spot at the midpoint of his route. The reason for this was the open field which was being turned into an unofficial litter dump. Since he had a seven-minute break between his trips, he decided to do something about the situation.

Taking advantage of his breaks through the day, the driver used the time to clear up the litter stage by stage into garbage bags. After some time, all the litter had been successfully cleared. Not stopping at that, he began to plant flower seeds on the land and soon turned it into a picturesque meadow. Learning of his creative efforts, many passengers would thereafter ride the extra distance with him to the parking lot, just to see the beautiful work he had done.

Possible Preaching Angle:

Would you be willing to do something beautiful today to make the world a better place to live in? An unknown author said, “Every job is a self-portrait of the person who does it. Autograph your work with excellence.” The Bible further says, “For we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do” (Eph. 2:10).

In 1958, Mao Zedong ordered the extermination of every sparrow in China. He could scarcely have guessed the magnitude of the disaster he had set in motion. They called it “The Four Pests Campaign.” As part of the Chinese Communist Party’s notorious “Great Leap Forward,” the public health effort called for the elimination of disease-carrying rats and flies, malaria-ridden mosquitoes, and sparrows, which ate grain seed and fruit. A propaganda poster from the time reading “Exterminate the four pests!” depicts the four pests, impaled like grotesque shish kebabs on a Chinese sword. In another, a boy aims his slingshot, a dastardly sparrow in his sights.

Urged on by their leaders, the people shot sparrows from the sky by the thousands and hunted down and destroyed their nests. Children would bang pots and pans at sparrows resting in trees, chasing them until the little birds plummeted from the heavens, overcome by exhaustion. Within a year, the sparrow population in China had been decimated, pushed nearly to extinction.

At first, it seemed as though the plan had worked. But the problem was, sparrows eat more than just grain and fruit. They also eat many kinds of insects, including a species of short-horned grasshopper commonly known as locusts. With their natural predator gone, the locust population skyrocketed, and hordes of ravenous grasshoppers swept through the countryside, devouring everything in their path and contributing significantly to the Great Chinese Famine. By 1961, tens of millions of Chinese peasants would be dead—starved to death by a tragic convergence of economic mismanagement and ecological imbalance.

Possible Preaching Angle:

What we see as unnecessary trouble or a thorn in the flesh, God allows into our lives because he can use it to refine us, strengthen us, and turn our hope toward heaven.

In the late 1980’s Gayla Benefield worked in a small town in Montana reading the meters of every house for the local utility company. She noticed there were many people home during the day. They were in their 40’s and 50’s, and on oxygen tanks, sick with various respiratory diseases or lung cancer. Puzzled, she did some investigating. She discovered a toxic form of asbestos, vermiculite, was used to insulate many homes during the harsh Montana winters. It was also used profusely as a soil conditioner in the parks and football fields.

She tried to tell anyone and everyone in the town about the hazard, but nobody would listen. Journalist Margaret Heffernan later reported the story and told National Public Radio:

In fact, she became so annoying, (and) kept insisting on telling this story to her neighbors, to her friends, to other people in the community. (Eventually) … a bunch of them got together and they made a bumper sticker which said, yes, I'm from Libby, Montana, and, no, I don't have asbestosis. But Gayla didn't stop.

A scientific researcher soon confirmed her suspicions. Even so, many in the town argued: “Well, if it were really dangerous … the doctors would have told us.” In total, over 400 people died from the substance and over 1,200 other people were affected. In the end, the EPA spent $120 million on the cleanup and a special asbestos clinic was set up to treat the residents.

Heffernan said:

There's a lot of willful blindness around these days ... There issues at work that people are afraid to raise. 85 percent of people … know there's a problem, but they won't say anything.

Possible Preaching Angles: Many people are also in denial about the deadly effects of sin. A Christian should persevere even when no one is listening to their warning about “sin, righteousness, and judgment” (John 16:8).

A garbage truck's worth of plastic enters the world's ocean every minute of every day. All told, humanity dumped up to 14 million tons of plastic pollution into the seas, and bits of it can found from the water's surface to its most extreme depths. You wouldn't know it looking over the side of a ship, since much of the waste has been broken down by waves and ultraviolet light into microplastics. But when researchers analyzed more than a million pieces of trash in the Pacific, 99 percent of it was plastic. By 2050, according to the World Economic Forum, there will be more plastic, by weight, in the ocean than fish.

Possible Preaching Angles: (1) Creation; Stewardship; Ecology—How are we taking care of the earth that God put in our care? (2) Sin—The glut of plastic is also a picture of sin—if we don't deal with it, our sin accumulates and becomes toxic.

BBC Earth worked with a British environmental specialist to commission a never-before-seen survey they call the "Earth Index." It seeks to measure "the financial value of nature." For example, here are the estimated monetary value for aspects of God's creation:

• Freshwater valued at $73.48 trillion
• Trees valued at $16.2 trillion
• Coral valued at $9.9 trillion
• Wild sea fish valued at $224 billion
• Plankton valued at $222 billion
• Bees and other pollinators valued at $170 billion
• Vultures valued at $2.6 billion
• One beaver valued at $120,000

A spokesman for BBC Earth commented: "When you see the figures in black and white it's illuminating to see that the annual revenues of the world's most successful companies, Apple; General Motors; Nestlé; Bank of China all pale in comparison to the financial return from natural assets to our economy." Another specialist concluded, "What this unequivocally shows is the major contribution that nature makes to our health, wealth, and security."

In an essay for Christianity Today, former CT editor David Neff gets eloquent about the beauty and meaning of the outdoors for Christians. While many in the 20th century forgot the importance of the natural world in Christian theology, the experience of encountering God's beautiful creation is a prompt to worship and care for the environment, conserving our natural resources for future generations, and for the good of the earth itself.

We should consider—how well are we expressing Christian values in our own use of and stewardship of resources? In the simple ways that many of us have influence over—the use of poisonous weedkiller in a backyard perhaps, or the extra effort of recycling—we can make an impact on the earth that can express consistent and historic Christian values of stewardship. Or, we can walk a path more self-centered than caring in rich love for our communities, future generations, and the earth.

Historian Simon Schama describes one of the most ecologically-friendly movements of the twentieth century. It initiated some of the first recycling programs, taught people how to garden for themselves, and intentionally took youth into the wilderness to experience the power of Creation. That movement was the Third Reich. From 1933-1935 Hitler enacted the first significant environmental legislation in modern history. Schama writes, "It is of course painful to acknowledge how ecologically conscientious the most barbaric regime in modern history actually was. Exterminating millions of lives was not at all incompatible with passionate protection of millions of trees."

When Jesus calls us to follow him, he does not call us to follow him in some areas of our life. Jesus asks for our entire lives. He asks for full obedience, not just "selective obedience."

Like most trends, going green has become a source of pride …. According to the Institute for Grocery Distribution, nearly 70 percent of today's shoppers reach for more expensive grocery items if they are marked organic, fair trade, or free range. Sales of groceries labeled organic have grown by an unbelievable 20 percent a year for over a decade now ….

Everything from your neighborhood supermarket to couture fashion has been marked by the fad. An outdoor-wear company, Patagonia, produces fleece jackets made from recycled plastic bottles. Diane von Furstenberg, Oscar de la Renta, Nike, and Levis all offer eco-friendly items. Even Sam's Club now sells jeans and T-shirts made with organic cotton …. The green revolution has even infiltrated corporate America …. The computer juggernaut Dell is working with the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to lower its carbon emissions footprint and launched an ambitious reforestation program …. Every time I turn on the television, it seems a celebrity [Bono's wife, Leonardo DiCaprio, and Julia Roberts, to name a few] is promoting his or her newest environmental pet project.

The message reverberates through culture beckons us to "go green" because we will look better and feel better and fit in …. [But as followers of Christ] we have deeper reasons to go green. We serve the Creator of the planet …. He created the earth and took the time to tell us his plan for it. The God of the universe has given us the great task of caring for our planet …. We have an operating manual for our planet right in front of us in the Bible, and we must allow that manual to change our thinking and behavior.

Andy Crouch writes in an article titled "Teaching People to Flourish”:

I lived in Boston in the 1980s, and I spoke with a pastor of a major church there. We were reflecting on the ways the church doesn't always recognize the culture cultivators and creators in its midst. This pastor said, "There's a woman in our church who was the lead litigator for the Environmental Protection Agency for the clean up of Boston Harbor. It's occurred to me since then that she played this incredibly important role in one of the great environmental success stories of the second half of the Twentieth Century. When I started high school, no one would put a toe in Boston Harbor, it was so polluted. And now there are beaches, and people go to the beach and swim. This Christian woman lawyer succeeded in litigating that case." He said, "The only time we have ever recognized her in church was for her role in teaching second grade Sunday school. And of course we absolutely should celebrate Sunday school teachers, but why did we never celebrate her incredible contribution to our whole city as a Christian, taking care of God's creation?"

We live in a time when people have become extremely conscious of nature, its beauty, its wonders, its indescribable value. We appreciate our planet more than we did before. We realize that in a very real sense, the earth gives us physical life. It's not surprising, then, that some people take this truth one step further and regard the planet as somehow giving them inner life as well.

This worldview is reflected in one sad news story. The story called attention to an increase in the number of suicides that occurred in U.S. national parks. The article cited several examples of people who had committed suicide that year in a national park, including a 65-year-old university biology professor who "disappeared into Utah's Canyonlands National Park, telling relatives in a note he was returning 'body and soul to nature.'"

The idea of returning the body to the earth has a long Christian history. Dust to dust. Notice, however, that this man also viewed his death as a way of returning his soul to nature, as though nature had somehow given him a soul in the beginning and at death his soul would be reunited with nature.

How different a worldview this is from that expressed by Jesus, who as he neared his death on the cross said, "Father, into your hands I commit my spirit."

We're all probably familiar with the Roman Catholic Church's list of seven deadly sins: pride, envy, gluttony, greed, lust, wrath, and sloth. But did you know the Roman Catholic Church recently added seven more? Pope Benedict XVI was concerned about the "decreasing sense of sin" in today's world, evidenced by the declining interest in the disciplined act of confession. The list, published in the Vatican newspaper, includes what Catholic leaders feel are more modern "violations of the basic rights of human nature." The seven additional sins are:

• Taking part in polluting the environment
• Genetic engineering
• Being obscenely wealthy
• Taking or selling drugs
• Having an abortion
• Engaging in pedophilia
• Causing social injustice

Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, head of the Vatican body which oversees confessions and plenary indulgences, says the move was made to help push people into deeper self-examination. "You offend God not only by stealing, blaspheming, or coveting your neighbor's wife," he says, "but also by ruining the environment, carrying out morally debatable scientific experiments, or allowing genetic manipulations which alter DNA or compromise embryos."

I grew up in the mountains of South India. My parents were missionaries to the tribal people of the hills, and our lives were about as simple as they could be—and as happy….

Rice was an important food for all of us. And since there was no level ground for wet cultivation, it was grown all along the streams that ran down the land's gentle slopes. These slopes had been patiently terraced hundreds of years before; and now every one was perfectly level, and bordered at its lower margin by an earthen dam covered by grass. Each narrow dam served as a footpath across the line of terraces, with a level field of mud and water six inches below its upper edge and another level terrace two feet below. There were no steep or high drop-offs, so there was little danger of collapse…

And it was here I learned my first lesson on conservation.

I was playing in the mud of a rice field with a half-dozen other little boys. We were racing to see who would be the first to catch three frogs. …Suddenly, we were all scrambling to get out of the paddy. One of the boys had spotted an old man walking across the path toward us. We all knew him as "Tata," or "Grandpa." He was the keeper of the dams. …Old age is very much respected in India, and we boys shuffled our feet and waited in silence for what we knew would be a rebuke.

He came over to us and asked us what we were doing. "Catching frogs," we answered. He stared down at the churned-up mud and flattened young rice plants in the corner where we had been playing. I was expecting him to talk about the rice seedlings we had just spoiled. Instead, the elder stooped down and scooped up a handful of mud. "What is this?" he asked. The biggest boy took the responsibility of answering for us all.

"It's mud, Tata," he replied.

"Whose mud is it?" the old man asked.

"It's your mud, Tata. This is your field."

Then the old man turned and looked at the nearest of the little channels across the dam. "What do you see there, in that channel?"

"That is water, running over into the lower field."

For the first time Tata looked angry. "Come with me and I will show you water." A few steps along the dam he pointed to the next channel, where clear water was running, "That is what water looks like," he said. Then we came back to our nearest channel, and he said again, "Is that water?"

We hung our heads. "No, Tata, that is mud."…

He went on to tell us that just one handful of mud would grow enough rice for one meal for one person, and it would do it twice every year for years and years into the future. "That mud flowing over the dam has given my family food since before I was born, and before my grandfather was born. It would have given my grandchildren and their grandchildren food forever. Now it will never feed us again. When you see mud in the channels of water, you know that life is flowing away from the mountains."

The old man walked slowly back across the path, pausing a moment to adjust with his foot the grass clod in our muddy channel so that no more water flowed through it. We were silent and uncomfortable as we went off to find some other place to play. I had experienced a dose of traditional Indian folk education that would remain with me as long as I lived. Soil is life, and every generation is responsible for all generations to come.