| In recent years, growing numbers of evangelicals have decided that part of their mandate from god is to help find solutions to global ecological problems. I think this is a great development in so many ways. One is that these folks will need to start working closely with the traditional keepers of environmentalism's keys, lefties. We can all benefit from working towards a common goal.
Working towards a common goal, however, may present some unexpected challenges along the way. For example, take today's blog entry from Gary Randall's Faith & Freedom Fdn (an anti-LGBT christian org). He gleefully promotes a news story that notes how divorce creates "extra" households (about 2 million of them), and how those households are a further strain on the resources and the environment. So to improve our environmental lot, get rid of divorce! This must be an appealing finding to many Christian fundamentalists, because it gives them a non-Biblical reason to oppose divorce that may appeal to secularists.
But have they stopped to think? There are somewhere between 3 million and 30 million gay or bi people in the country. According to the 2000 US Census, only 600,000 of us are living together as couples. Many of us live separately because the inability to legally marry and be out at work makes it difficult, impractical or dangerous to live together. So like the divorced hetero households, many of us are probably using more energy per person than we would be if we had the same legal protections and institutions open to us that straight people do. Think of how much energy we could save if we could all marry!
Once they get around to realizing the implications of the "save a marriage, save the planet!" excitement, this will doubtless become a head-scratcher for some environmentally-minded evangelicals. Is there common ground here?
Cross-posted at PHB. |
