Daily Times of Pakistan:

LAHORE: Electricity shortage has exceeded 3,500 megawatts and load shedding is likely to increase across the country, Geo TV reported on Sunday. The water in both Tarbela and Mangla dams has dropped to dead levels, causing the shortfall, the channel quoted PEPCO officials as saying. The electricity demand had shot up after an increase in the use of air conditioners...

Ah, load shedding.

We lived in Guam for a couple of years in the early 90’s. The island was making the difficult transition from a 50 year old Navy-run power grid to a public utility and a growing tourist hotel presence on the island. Regularly scheduled blackouts were a fact of life. We learned to put up with them with the help of kerosene lanterns swung from hooks on the walls in case of earthquakes. We weren’t missing much in the way of TV back then anyway. There was that one stretch of outages by which we knew the wristwatch on the guy running the grid was running exactly seven minutes late. And while my very pregnant better half sometimes bristled at the loss of air conditioning twice a day, I quite liked the night-time blackouts that revealed a carpet of stars stretching from one horizon to the other, and bright blue phosphorescence on the reefs.

Anywho, one Pakistani doctor suggests their current power situation is the path to religious, military, political, and economic salvation:

Then there are my dear and good friends who keep pointing out that if only we as a nation revert to the true Sunnah, all our problems would be solved almost immediately. During periods of load shedding my mind does indeed turn to such admonishments.

More importantly, the only major advances in Muslim history, scientific, cultural and political, occurred before electricity was discovered. The Mughals, the Ottomans, the Safavids, the Ommayyads in Spain, the Fatimids in Egypt all brought great glory to Islam without a car, a motorbike, a split air-conditioner or a cell phone in sight.

Therefor I am convinced, especially during periods of load-shedding that our new and popularly elected government wants us, the people of the Islamic Republic, to revert to our greatness by recreating the environment in which Muslims excelled and built rich and thriving empires. In this connection I have a few suggestions that are offered in the true humility of my faith...

Heh. And this bit was great:

Also, the Islamic Republic will literally have no ‘carbon footprint’ since there will be virtually no production of ‘green-house’ gases except those produced in a biological fashion or in the industrial enclaves.

Therefore we can sell our carbon units to our neighbours to the east and the north. And if there are no airplanes, no cell phones and no ‘pillion riding’, then as a country we can demand a lot of money from our benefactors in the West. They all know what those three can lead to!

Hmmmmmm. Load shedding as a U.S. political platform? Nah - we’re way too impure for that.

CalCatholic.com:

What I have found odd is that so many Catholics, especially female religious, should gravitate toward what appears to be essentially pantheism or what some eco-spirituality thinkers prefer to call “panentheism” (the universe as the “body of God”) when the Church has addressed the entire ecology question in a way that would, practically speaking, lead to the same results in terms of respect for the created order and sustainability.

Indeed.

Given the present direction of Catholic movement on climate change, and given that many global warmists are also anti-populationists, it’s not hard to envision a collision with the Church’s pro-life values. The way to reconcile this, of course, is by proclaiming the Personhood of the Trinity and the value of human beings created in His image while upholding ecology as stewardship, not dogma.

“Love the Lord with all your heart, soul, mind and strength, and love your neighbor as yourself,” is the Commandment. “Love the planet” has never been in Jesus’ vernacular.

Confusion between the two is growing.

[Don’s other habitat is www.evangelicalecologist.com]

I’m hosting this month’s Oekologie environmental science blog carnival. Lots of interesting stuff if you’ve got a hankering for a little less politics shaken on your greens.

Ted Turner in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution today: (via)

One way to combat global warming, Turner said, is to stabilize the population. “We’re too many people; that’s why we have global warming,” he said. “Too many people are using too much stuff.” Turner suggested that “on a voluntary basis, everybody in the world’s got to pledge to themselves that one or two children is it.”

Admitting that he’s “always suffered from foot-in-the-mouth disease,” Turner added, “I’ve gotten a lot better, though. It’s been a long time since anybody caught me saying something stupid.”

There’s an obvious retort here; I’ll leave that to you smart folks.

Will also leave Jordan to weigh in on the population control stuff. But I will point out that Turner is one of those guys for whom overpopulation is a problem (for whatever reason), but who never seems eager to be the first to leave the gene pool.

[Don’s other habitat is the Evangelical Ecologist]

This bit in this week’s Telegraph nails something I’ve been wrangling with for a while. Maybe you men out there can relate:

Many men believe the world is now dominated by women and that they have lost their role in society, fuelling feelings of depression and being undervalued. Research shows the extent to which men have had to change within one or two generations, adapting to new rules and different expectations. Asked what it meant to be a man in the 21st century, more than half thought society was turning them into “waxed and coiffed metrosexuals”, and 52 per cent say they had to live according to women’s rules. What they apparently want is what some American academics have dubbed a “menaissance” - a return to manliness, where figures such as Sir Winston Churchill were models of manhood.

It’s not a “feminization” thing really, and to push back here isn’t being chauvinistic. Most guys are cool with being softer around the edges especially when we connect it to loving our wives and daughters in ways that are meaningful to them.

But our culture has fallen into the trap of thinking husbands are supposed to love the way they do. We’re supposed to be our wife’s best girlfriend, with a winkie and chest hair added as a bonus. After all, we rationalize, it’s our wives who understand what love is all about, and men who don’t climb on board their way of thinking are dufuses or oafs and are certainly not interested in the relationship…

But that doesn’t really cut it, does it guys.

A girlfriend that sometimes leaves the toilet seat up? That’s not what you really want either, is it gals.

A brother in our church’s men’s group stuck a copy of Emerson Eggerichs Love & Respect in my hands a couple months ago. Was up most of the night reading it. Also listened to an audio interview by James “What Wives Wished Their Husbands Knew About Women” Dobson, who essentially smacked himself in the forehead for promoting the husbands-must-think-like-wives mantra for so long that he missed the obvious.

It’s the point that the Telegraph’s reporterette finally gets to at the bottom of her article cited above:

Harvey Mansfield, a Harvard professor and America’s best known political philosopher, who tackles the topic in his book Manliness, says the issue is ignored. “A man has to be embarrassed about being a man. I am trying to bring back the word manliness. It’s not respected,” he said.

Men, says Eggerichs, are built for honor and respect. It’s as much our “love language” as when our wives wish we’d listen to them talk about their day or - hubba hubba - do the dishes or laundry.

Continue reading "We Need a Menaissance"

Dr. Frank S. Page
President, Southern Baptist Convention
and
Mr. Richard Land
SBC Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission
and
Pastor Jonathan Merritt
Cross Pointe Church

Brothers in Christ:

As a member in good standing of the Southern Baptist Church and a Christian who has through much prayer and Bible study come to acknowledge God’s desire that the church take seriously her role in stewardship of creation, I have been closely following the release of A Southern Baptist Declaration on the Environment and Climate Change and the Southern Baptist Convention’s reaction to it.

First let me say I respect the SBC’s right as an organization to issue public policy statements on the environment and climate change, even when these statements don’t always reflect my personal views. I appreciate many of the previous resolutions passed by the SBC urging stewardship of the earth’s resources while caring for the poor in developing countries.

I also appreciate that both the SBC and Pastor Merritt have formally stated our need as Baptists to fully engage in many areas of Christian environmental stewardship. Certainly these are tasks about which, through the power of Christ, God expects us all to be dilligent until His return.

I am concerned, however, that in the haste to distance the SBC from A Southern Baptist Declaration or the signers of their Declaration to distance themselves from the SBC you both are misrepresenting me and thousands of other Southern Baptists in two important areas.

First, there is the needless appearance of deep division. The messengers to the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in San Antonio, Texas, June 12-13, 2007, urged Southern Baptists to

“proceed cautiously in the human-induced global warming debate in light of conflicting scientific research.”

“A Southern Baptist Declaration” says

We recognize that Christians are not united around either the scientific explanations for global warming or policies designed to slow it down...this is an issue where Christians may find themselves in justified disagreement about both the problem and its solutions. Yet, even in the absence of perfect knowledge or unanimity, we have to make informed decisions about the future.

Both resolutions suggest Southern Baptists move forward on ecology while respecting that there will inevitably be disagreement on the nature and extent of climate change.

The remedy for this should be obvious. We should not be afraid of tackling any social issue, including environmnental ones. And we must press forward and commit to praying for each other and for wisdom and unity within the body of Christ. This public and rather unseemly display is a foothold that the enemy of the church is happy to exploit. To that end I hope that you [and all those reading this letter. db] will join me in prayer this week, humbled by the fact that only God ultimately controls the affairs of His Creation.

Much more importantly, none of you seem concerned about the tragedy of missing our God-given opportunity here under the Great Commission. An editorial to the Tuscaloosa News by a Mr. James W. Anderson illustrates my point:

I urge the leadership of our Southern Baptist Convention to be about serving our member churches, evangelism and bringing lost souls to Christ. To those currently choosing to carry the liberal environmental torches, perhaps you should consider leaving the organization and entering politics. The two do not mix — at all!

Don’t let his confusion on the pedigree of the Declaration distract you from the real spiritual disaster. Mr. Anderson sees environmentalism as a hinderance to evangelism rather than an opportunity to establish relationships with, and bring the love of Christ to, vast numbers of God’s children who would never darken the door of a Baptist church.

The fact that he doesn’t apparently know about scriptures referencing God’s heart on ecology, doesn’t understand the role of creation in bringing glory to God, doesn’t see creation care as a mission field, doesn’t view climate change action opponents and proponents both as human beings in need of a Savior, and doesn’t think engaging in challenging environmental issues like climate change provide openings for the Gospel message to our generation is not his failing. Rather, it is a direct reflection on the historic failure of our Southern Baptist leadership and many of those in our pulpits to communicate a Spirit-filled, biblical message on creation care.

Rather than continue this division I urge you, therefor, to return your focus to the Lord of Creation. Join with me to pray for reconciliation, for wise yet diligent action, and for the earnest encouragement of pastors and their congregations to make stewardship of the environment as important a priority as stewardship of their missions budgets and church growth projects.

Thanks for your consideration.

Grace and peace,
Don Bosch

[Don’s other habitat is The Evangelical Ecologist]

The big boys at the Southern Baptist Convention are running from Jon Merritt’s statement on ecology and climate change faster than a pack of polyester-clad deacons trying to beat the Assembly of God folks to Denny’s for Sunday brunch.

The so-called “Southern Baptist” statement is not an initiative of the Southern Baptist Convention which voiced its views on global warming last summer in a resolution, “On Global Warming”.

More from WorldNetDaily:

“For the record, there has been no change in convention policy and despite the media blitz that suggests otherwise, there does not appear to be a groundswell of support for change,” explained Will Hall, vice president for news services for the SBC, a member of the executive committee and executive editor of the Baptist Press. “Jonathan Merritt does not speak for the Southern Baptist Convention. Unfortunately, his use of ‘Southern Baptist’ in the title of his declaration misinforms the public and misrepresents the Southern Baptist Convention.”

They are making Jon’s point here quite perfectly:

We recognize that Christians are not united around either the scientific explanations for global warming or policies designed to slow it down. Unlike abortion and respect for the biblical definition of marriage, this is an issue where Christians may find themselves in justified disagreement about both the problem and its solutions. Yet, even in the absence of perfect knowledge or unanimity, we have to make informed decisions about the future.

Difficult to make informed decisions - or influence the discussion for that matter - when you feel it’s beneath your religious dignity to even show up.

By the way, if climate change is the new orthodoxy, is Merritt a young Martin Luther upsetting the old orthodoxy? We’ll know for sure if the SBC calls for him to retract his statement or face excommunication.

[Don’s other habitat is The Evangelical Ecologist]

OSD’s Annual Report to Congress on the Military Power of the People’s Republic of China has some illuminating - and somewhat staggering - insight on the current state of affairs with respect to China’s environment and how it influences their national strategic policies. It’s a fascinating look at how the emerging communist nation is dealing with the realities of becoming a global superpower.

Continue reading "Red China Struggles to Go Green"

Matt Stone asks the question: What do you think are some of the challenges that remain for Christian environmental theology?

I am presuming here that, if you’re the sort of Christian that likes a blog like mine, you’re not the sort of Christian who needs to have the dots joined between Christian ethics, creation care and environmental theology. But where do we go beyond the basic joining of the dots? How much more remains to be done... [snip]

Personally I think much work needs to be done with worship, with leadership training, with apologetics, and of course, with practice. Where do you see blind spots and opportunities for growth?

He offers a couple links as answers. I’d suggest this would be a great topic of discussion for the next Let’s Tend the Garden Conference (my notes from the first two here and here). Will shoot this link to the folks in Boise and see what they think.

Have you got a different answer for him? For that matter, has Christian ecology gotten too theological for its own good?

[Don’s other habitat is The Evangelical Ecologist.]

Found a study on sociobiology in The Economist (of all places).

This passage on the development of liberal vice conservative tendencies was worth a chuckle:

Dr Wilson and Dr Storm found several unexpected differences between the groups. Liberal teenagers always felt more stress than conservatives, but were particularly stressed if they could not decide for themselves whom they spent time with. Such choice, or the lack of it, did not change conservative stress levels. Liberals were also loners, spending a quarter of their time on their own. Conservatives were alone for a sixth of the time. That may have been related to the fact that liberals were equally bored by their own company and that of others. Conservatives were far less bored when with other people. They also preferred the company of relatives to non-relatives. Liberals were indifferent. Perhaps most intriguingly, the more religious a liberal teenager claimed to be, the more he was willing to confront his parents with dissenting beliefs. The opposite was true for conservatives.

Stressed out, bored, lonely and confrontational. That explains a lot, including the way progressives see environmental issues more often than not as problems rather than opportunities.

Hug your favorite liberal today - they probably need it.

[Don’s other habitat is The Evangelical Ecologist]