By Lance Dickie
The Seattle Times
June 15, 2007
Fifteen years after the pioneering Earth Ministry was founded in Seattle to link religion and the environment, the nation’s attention will be drawn back to the city toward another, potentially broader spiritual awakening.
Next April, the national Episcopal Church will team with Episcopalians in Western Washington to host a conference to launch a multifaith campaign on climate change.
At the event, the Episcopal Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori will invite national organizations of Christians, Jews and Muslims to commit to reducing the carbon footprint of their churches, temples and mosques by a minimum of 50 percent by 2015.
The “Genesis Covenant” is not intended to be adopted by a parish here and a synagogue there, but promoted and acted upon by the associations, councils and assemblies that speak for denominations and faiths.
The audacious idea was unveiled in Seattle two weeks ago at a four-day interfaith gathering to explore the role and responsibility of religion in caring for the Earth. Bishop Steven Charleston, president and dean of the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, Mass., closed out the session with a sermon that laid out the concept and the challenge.
Maybe there was a divine nudge, because he had not planned to bring up the proposal. Things picked up speed from there.
Next, he went to church headquarters in New York City where the presiding bishop endorsed the vision, and pledged to ask the governing General Convention for the money to make it work when its lay members, clergy and bishops next meet in 2009.
Charleston, a former bishop of Alaska, wants a lot more than a thundering imperative from the pulpit to go and do. He wants an interactive Web site to help congregations and religious leaders with ideas and technical information, and offer a forum for discussing environmental topics and faith.
I caught up with Charleston on Wednesday by phone as he was waiting for the first organizational meeting to convene via conference call. On the line would be the Rev. Carla Pryne, who cofounded Earth Ministry in 1992. She is currently interim rector at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Edmonds.
She was a decade ahead of the broad community of faith. David Domke, an associate professor at the University of Washington, thinks the change began about five years ago, especially among the ranks of conservative evangelicals. Domke is a national expert and author on the busy intersection of religion and politics.
The change, dare I say evolution, of attitude began as the book of Genesis was reread and reconsidered. Instead of granting humankind dominion over the Earth with the right to plunder and despoil, God’s creation was seen as a gift that carried responsibilities and obligations to future generations.
Muslims, Christians and Jews share a common grounding in the creation, and the texts of their faiths counsel about protecting the Earth and conserving scarce resources. Ismail Ahmad, a religious adviser to the Islamic Center of Seattle, says the admonition even goes to not wasting water used to wash before prayers.
The transition from a dominion ethic to a perspective of stewardship is far from complete across religions and politics.
A statement known as the Evangelical Climate Initiative was issued in February 2006 and signed by leading pastors, university presidents and other leaders and thinkers. Among the signatories was the Rev. Dr. Joel Hunter, the head of a 15,000-member church in Longwood, Fla.
Later in 2006, Hunter resigned an appointment to lead the Christian Coalition. As president-elect he had made clear he wanted to enlarge the agenda from one defined as personal morality — opposition to abortion, gay marriage and stem cells — to include the environment, poverty and AIDS. The core leadership — Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell and others — refused to risk alienating their base.
Politics roil, but the embrace of the environment by religious communities continues. Some of it is generational. For those in their 20s and 30s, it is a given, Hunter explained earlier this week.
Before he signed the climate initiative in 2006, he reread sacred Scripture and investigated the science, convinced he had missed something important. In the end, he said he was led to a conclusion more people of faith are drawn toward: “We are made in the image of God to be responsible for God’s creation.”
Sounds like something one might hear in liberal Seattle.
Lance Dickie’s column appears regularly on editorial pages of The Times. His e-mail address is ldickie@seattletimes.com