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God, Creationand ClimateChangeA resource or refection and discussion
The Lutheran World Federation A Communion o Churches
Geneva, 2009
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God, Creationand Climate Change
A resource or refection and discussion
Karen L. Bloomquistwith Rolita Machila
on behal o
The Lutheran World Federation
-- A Communion o Churches
Department or Theology and Studies
Geneva, 2009
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TheLutheranWorldFederation
The views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reect the ofcial position
o the Lutheran World Federation
Cover, design and layout: LWF/OCS
Cover image: Magnus Aronson/IKON
Editorial assistance: LWF/DTS
The Lutheran World Federation
A Communion o Churches
150 route de Ferney
P.O Box 21001211 Geneva 2 Switzerland
Tel. + 41/22-791 61 11
Fax +41/22-791 66 30
For additional copies, please contact uli@lutheranworld.org
2009, The Lutheran World Federation
Printed in France by SADAG
ISBN 978-3-905676-69-3
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God,CreationandClimateChange
Contents
I. What is going on? ....................................................................7
II. God and climate change? .................................................... 11
III. The Triune God is intimately related
with all o creation ................................................................... 17
IV. So what about human beings? ............................................27
V. The redemption o all creation ............................................35
Notes .......................................................................................... 41
Appendix ...................................................................................43
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Crashing waves at Spoon Bay, New South Wales,Australia. ickr/brentbat / Brent Pearson
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God,CreationandClimateChange
This resource is part o the Lutheran World Federations overall
strategy on the challenges posed by what today is reerred to as
climate change.
Many LWF member churches are deeply aected by and increas-
ingly active in addressing this concern and there is a growingpublic awareness o the ethical challenges posed by climate
change. Ecumenical, interaith and civil society collaboration is
crucial in the eorts being made to seek changes in local, national
and global practices.
Yet, climate change is more than just a secular environmental
issue; it is an urgent challenge that goes to the core o our aith
and spirituality and how this is reected in the ways we view the
world and in what we do. Climate change is moving us to recon-
sider and revise what we have previously assumed or believed. In
that sense, it is changing theologyhow we have thought about
God and the rest o creation especially in the modern era.
In 2008, a survey was sent out asking people in dierent local set-
tings what they see, eel and believe in the ace o changes that,at least in part, are due to climate change (see appendix). This
resource was written in light o responses to the survey, some
o which are quoted here. The changes people are experiencing
oten raise questions or assumptions that are deeply theological
and need to be addressed in these terms. This is the main purpose
o this resource.
A book o more in-depth biblical, theological and ethical articles,will be published to accompany and examine more extensively
Preace
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what is set orth here in an only summary ashion. God, Creation
and Climate Change, vol. 5 in the Theology in the Lie o the Church
series will be published later in 2009. To order this book, please
contact liesch@lutheranworld.org.
The LWF is also addressing this challenge through concrete actions in
its feld programs in many o the most vulnerable parts o the world.
Climate change has been a ocus o LWF youth (seeA Toolkit on Cli-
mate Change, rom lwyouth@lutheranworld.org) and in advocacy
based on positions adopted, e.g., by the LWF council. Other events
ocusing on this will also take place prior to and culminate at the 2010
LWF Assembly in Stuttgart.
We look orward to your responses.
Karen L. Bloomquist at kbl@lutheranworld.org
or Rolita Machila at rom@lutheranworld.org
This publication can also be downloaded and printed from the De-
partment for Theology and Studies Church and Social Issues web
pages on www.lutheranworld.org. Translation in other languages
will also be posted there.
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God,CreationandClimateChange
Around the world we are experienc-
ing the eects o climate change:
water and air temperatures are rising
at alarming rates, adversely aecting
the habitats that sustain lie or fsh,
animals, plants and human beings.Devastation caused by more severe
droughts and oods is increasing.
Storms and hurricanes are becoming
more requent and intense. New dis-
eases are appearing and old ones are
spreading. For example, because o
warmer temperatures the breeding
o malaria-carrying mosquitoes has
increased. In overly industrialized
areas, the air quality is deteriorating.
Climate conditions are aecting peo-
ples health and in some areas heat-
related deaths are on the increase.1
Hunger is predicted to escalate as
the climate changes.
The predictable, dependable order
o things is changing: when winter
or summer begins, or when the rainy
season comes, i at all, is becoming
ever more unpredictable. The avail-
ability o clean water to sustain lie is
jeopardized, especially as much o itis being privatized. Houses built on
What are local people notic-
ing? Rainalls are erratic and
there is less rain each year.
Streams and rivers are drying
up, and many areas lack water.
Lower crop yields have led
to higher ood prices and,
consequently, malnutrition.
Malaria and other diseases
are increasing. People ght
over ertile lands where there
is water, resulting in conficts.
(Zambia)
What are some
o the eects o
climate change in
your context?
I. What is going on?
There is either too much sun
or too much rain. The land,
the plants, the air, the ani-
mals and human beings are
suering. Animals do not pro-
create as they did in the past.
Skin diseases have become
more prevalent. (Tanzania)
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what seemed to be solid ground are
suddenly swept into raging waters.
Growing seasons or crops are chang-
ing signifcantly, as is the yield ocrops related to soil quality, moisture
and erosion. In some places, winters
are becoming colder, and in others,
warmer. Where the ood needed or
daily lie will come rom, and when, is
becoming more unpredictable, mak-
ing the right to ood more precarious,
especially or the most vulnerable.
Some are wondering whether they
can still rely on Gods promise to
Noah: As long as the earth endures,
seedtime and harvest, cold and heat,
summer and winter, day and night,
shall not cease (Gen 8:22).
As the Intergovernmental Panel on
Climate Change (IPCC) concluded
in 2007:
Human beings are exposed to climate
change through changing weather
patterns (or example, more intenseand requent extreme events) and
indirectly through changes in water,
air, ood quality and quantity, eco-
systems, agriculture, and economy
Increased requency o heat stress,
droughts and oods negatively aect
crop yields and livestock beyond
the impacts o mean climate change,creating the possibility or surprises,
We used to plow our land
starting in March but now, un-
less it rains, the soil is too hard
to plow. In the past, the seeds
stayed in the soil until the
rain started but now they die
beore the rain comes. We get
less milk rom our cows and
goats because o the scarcity
o odder. We used to get wild
ruits rom the trees but now
the ew trees remaining do
not bear ruit. Our parents
and grandparents used to
consume milk, butter, honey,
dierent ruits and vegetables
but not today. (Eritrea)
In a river system that covers
a large part o Australia, not
one drop o water rom this
system has reached the ocean
in the past ten years, due to
droughts caused in part by
global warming. (Australia)
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God,CreationandClimateChange
with impacts that are larger, and oc-
curring earlier, than predicted using
changes in mean variables alone.
This is especially the case or subsis-tence sectors at low latitudes. Climate
variability and change also modiy
the risks o fres, pest and pathogen
outbreak, negatively aecting ood,
fber and orestry.
In other words, the predictabilities
on which we have depended or lieas human beings have long known
it are changing dramatically. We
wonder on what we can depend or
the uture.
As numerous studies have indicated,
it is especially human activity that
is causing or at least signifcantly
contributing to climate change. Nev-
ertheless, or people in many parts o
the world or whom there is a close
relationship between the divine and
what occurs through nature, the
God questions cannot be ignored.
Our barrier island is erod-
ing and we will be orced to
relocate our Eskimo village i
the trend continues. The local
people depend on traditional
subsistence hunting and
shing, such that a orced
relocation will be very dicult
or them. (Alaska, USA)
Repeated monsoons food the
land or long periods, and the
sea level is rising. In coastal
areas, salt water rom the sea
is intruding into the drinking
water. The over-cultivation
o the land and the use o
pesticides are degrading
the quality o the land. The
topography o the land is
changing dramatically, and
the biodiversity o plants, sh
and animals is threatened.
(Bangladesh)
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Korat, Thailand, 17 March 2005 -- Waters have dried up due to prolonged drought, allowingvillagers to camp inside the dam to catch the remaining fsh. Greenpeace/Sataporn Thongma
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God,CreationandClimateChange 11
Some people view climate change as i
God had disappeared rom the scene,
had been pushed to the margins by
human activity and was no longer ac-
tive in the cosmos. But or persons o
aith, the extensive global and cosmicrealities o climate change need to be
considered in light o how we under-
stand God, creation and humanity.
In many passages o the Bible, natu-
ral occurrences such as those oc-
curring today due to human-induced
climate change, were attributed to
God. People in many parts o the
world still do so today. God has been
considered the agent causing oods,
storms, droughts and other local and
global natural catastrophes. People
view what is occurring as being acts
o God, and ask why.
Throughout the ages and rom di-
erent aith perspectives, weather
related disasters have oten been
considered as acts o God. When
the destructive eects o climate
change occur, some immediately
respond that God must be punishinghuman beingsand this is how they
God has moved away rom
destructive human beings,
leaving them to perish in their
own olly. (A young woman
in Tanzania)
II. God and climate change?
In a world progressively
endangered by deoresta-
tion, desertication, globalwarming, depletion o the
ozone layer, dangerous
carbon emission, greenhouse
gas eect and multiple orms
o ecological degradation,
Arican spiritualityis a spiri-
tuality o balance, harmony,
and wholeness, sustained by
an active aith in creation as
Gods git.
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interpret certain biblical passages.
People are told simply to wait and
endure Gods judgment, rather than
doing anything to change what isconsidered to be God ordained and
thus, inevitable.
As people o aith, we maintain that
somehow God is involved in climate
changeespecially to wake us up to
the urgency o what is occurringbut
we cannot attribute climate changeonly to acts o God. We must also
turn to science, through which we
learn more deeply, and with greater
awe, about what God has created.
Many o the problems associated with
climate change have arisen because o
how human beings have misused that
which God has created or the beneft
o all creatures. The church has long
taught that we are to be good stewards
or caretakers o what God has given,
and must continue to do so. But the
challenge goes deeper than this.
To a large extent, many global acets
o the climate change crisis have
come about because o how inter-
related assumptions about God,
creation and human beings have
prooundly inuenced and shaped
modern societies, institutions and
ways o lie. These have been passedon through centuries o teachings in
One Arican woman ponders,
Where is God in all o this
suering? Are we cursed? Is
God punishing us? Another
responds, I have problems
placing this all on God! We as
human beings are responsible
or disturbing what God has
given in nature.
Its not divine punishment,
but it is the logic o conse-
quences, the act that in
this physical universe that
God has created, with this
wonderul atmosphere,
certain actions cause other
things to happen. Thats the
physics o carbon dioxide and
other greenhouse gases that
trap heat. You cannot keep
increasing carbon without
warming the planet. (USA)
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
the church, which or example, sepa-
rated nature rom grace. Western
thinking which tended to separate
human beings rom the rest o cre-ation contributed to the rise o indus-
trialization and capitalism. Develop-
ments such as these, in turn, have
spread throughout the world. Over
the centuries, these assumptions,
and the practices based on them,
have contributed cumulatively and
now disastrously to climate change,which seriously threatens the uture
o lie on the planet as we have known
it. The eect o climate change is like
that o hungerit weakens, gnaws
and although it may not be the sole
cause o death, it pushes you in that
direction.
These assumptions include,
That God is transcendent, un-
changing, all powerul, a heav-
enly monarch or patriarch ruling
above and controlling the world,
untouched by earthly realities
A worldview with God at the top,
then men over women, children,
animals and, at the bottom, the
rest o creation
That as agents o God, human
beings are to use or exert powerover the rest o creation
Why are the changes happen-
ing? Because o human greed,
carelessness and selshness.
(Tanzania)
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That God acts primarily in history
and not also in and through nature
That only human beings, and spe-cifcally Christians, beneft rom
Gods grace or redemption
That spiritual matters are sepa-
rate rom what is embodied or o
this earth.
The inuence and eects o assump-tions such as these have spread over
the entire world through colonization,
conquest, empire building, missionary
movements and economic develop-
ment. This continues today through
accelerated processes o globalization.
These assumptions have undergirded
and urthered habits and practices
around the world that we now realize
have, over time, contributed dramati-
cally to climate change and are threat-
ening lie as we have known it.
Such practices include,
Economic lie based on endless
quests or ever greater growth
and proft driven by greed, which
the global economic crisis is
starkly exposing today
Increasing dependence on ossil
uel extraction to urther thisdevelopment
What language, im-
ages or teachings
have you heard in
church that refectthese assumptions?
We need new ways o think-
ing and behaving, new ways
o perceiving reality. Todays
capitalism does not have a
uture. We must construct a
sustainable economic system.
Maybe it looks like utopia. But
there is no uture without
Gods help. God can do mir-acleseven change human
hearts. (Czech Republic)
For most Aboriginal peoples in
Australia, the Rainbow Spirit
emerges rom the land andreturns to the land where its
power is eternally present.
This Spirit is always as close as
the land, leaving prints on the
land as reminders o its prom-
ise to return rom the land. In
contrast, Christian missionaries
presented God dwelling at
a distance rom the land, in
heaven. (Australia)
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
Conquering practices o colo-
nization and empire, especially
in the constant quest or more
resources and markets
Patriarchal ideologies that perpet-
uate control over and oppression
o both women and the earth
Discrimination against all those
seen as other because o their
gender, race, ethnicity, caste,economic or political status
Assuming that some aspects o
creation (such as trees, water or
air) are dispensable, rather than
respecting and valuing all o
creation
An anthropocentrism that tends
to value only that which serves
human ends.
Climate change is provoking the need
or climatic changes in some aith
understandings that have long beentaken or granted. Climate change may
literally be melting icebergs but it also
exposes metaphorical icebergs o
how God, human beings and the rest
o creation have been conceptualized
in ways that contribute to the destruc-
tion and injustices that have escalated
under the currently reigning regimeo climate change.
Assumptions and
practices such as
those cited here
need to be chal-
lenged. Instead, we
need to consider
how God, creationand humanity are
interrelated. How
might we draw
upon what other
aiths and local
traditions have
long assumed andpracticed?
Nature was created to
distribute well-being, not to
be transormed into a mere
source o prot, not to swap
the green o the orest or the
green o the dollar.(Peru)
Traditional Sri Lankan society
has been strongly infuenced
by Buddhism and lived in har-
mony with nature . It wasthe Western materialistic con-
sumerist strategy, considered
the essence o development,
which shattered the ounda-
tion o sustainable living that
is basic to our cultures. (Sri
Lanka)
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Goro ICDP, Dadymus, Ethiopia, March 2008. Nothing but dust. Animal going toand rom the water-point. Magnus Aronson/IKON
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
When people think about God they
oten reer to a supreme being who
reigns over and above the world
as an almighty ruler or monarch
(almost always as he). When some-
thing goes wrong in nature, suchas occurs under climate change, it
is then immediately assumed that
this is caused by Godas an
almighty actor standing outside o
and controlling all that occurs on
earth. Throughout the ages, and in
many religious traditions, humans
have prayed and oered sacrifces
so that God would bestow avorable
conditions or growing crops, pro-
tect rom storms and rising waters,
and control the natural orces o the
environment. Ater all, isnt God the
power over all the cosmos, and thus
the One able to control everything,including climate change?
Many biblical reerences seem to
reect such understandings o God.
These are oten interpreted in ways
that make too sharp a separation
between God and nature. In part, this
was to distinguish ancient Israels un-derstanding o God rom some o the
III. The Triune Godis intimately relatedwith all o creation
God, why dont you inter-
vene? Why do you allow such
destructive climate changes
to persist?
God, why dont you care a bit
more about what you have
created?
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nature religions, according to which
the ate o humans was determined
by the gods acting in the cycles
and orces o nature. But, making asharp separation between God and
nature becomes a problem when it
overlooks the intimate relationship
that God has with all o creation,
as described in the beginning o
Genesis and in many other places in
the Bible.
Holy, holy, holy is the Lord o hosts,
the whole Earth is ull o his glory
(Isa 6:3) The glory here is the vibrant
presence o God, which was earlier
depicted as the fre cloud o Gods
presence at Sinai. Later it illed
the tabernacle and then the temple
o Solomon. But here Isaiah goes
urther and declares that Gods very
presence flls the whole earth, which
is Gods sanctuary.
The God revealed in the Hebrew Scrip-
tures is not unchanging in the same
way as are some other gods. God isrelated to creation and history not by
being immune to space and time but by
keeping promises. Gods will should
not simply be equated with natural
occurrences, insisting that God is caus-
ing all that occurs. Yet, at the same
time, we may glimpse what God has
created and intends, which contrastswith the breakdown or destruction o
The brokenness o earth is the
brokenness o Gods home.3
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
the ragility o creation that is occur-
ring through climate change. Creation
is good because God created all that is,
although not everything that occursin creation is good.
In the Book o Job, when Job reaches
the depths o despair he not only
accuses God o harassing humans
unjustly, but also indicts God or
Gods rough treatment o creation.
Job claims that God uses divine wis-dom to hold back the waters until
they dry up and to unloosen them
so they ood the land (Job 12:15).
In chapters 38-39, God takes Job on
a tour o the various aspects o the
cosmos to enlighten him about the
mysterious ways o the natural
world. It is not or Job to try to rule
nature, but to explore how God has
created all that exists and to discover
how humans ft into this mysteriously
complex design o God.
Here and elsewhere in Scripture,
we begin to catch a new sense owho God isnot an all-controlling
monarch who punishes even the in-
nocent, but God revealed yet hidden
throughout creation. Gods grace and
love are ultimately more crucial than
might and power. God is intimately
related with humans and the rest
o creation, present in the midst ovulnerability and suering.
Then the Lord answered
Job out o the whirlwind:
[W]ho shut in the sea with
doors when it burst out
rom the womb? [Who]
said, Thus ar shall you come,
and no arther, and here
shall your proud waves be
stopped? (Job 38:1, 8, 11).
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Today, a similar shit is called or
in how we imagine or think o God,
standing as we do in the midst o a
creation suering the eects o cli-mate change. Those who have used
little o the earths resources fnd
themselves the most dramatically
aected. Yet, blaming God or this is
not the answer. As Scripture continu-
ally reminds us, human unaithul-
ness to God is the problem. This is
reected in the unjust treatment ohumans and the rest o creation.
The twentieth-century Lutheran
ecological theologian, Joseph Sittler,
insisted that nature comes rom God,
cannot be apart rom God, and is
capable o bearing the glory o God.4
Grace is the undamental reality o
God, as Creator, Redeemer, Sustainer.
Grace is the sheer giveness o lie, the
world and ourselves. We are justi-
fed by grace even in our relation
to the things o nature. Condemna-
tion (the opposite o justifcation) is
present in the absence o a graciousregard or nature, such as when we
pollute or use nature as a dump.
This concurs with Martin Luthers
sixteenth-century perspective: all o
creation is the abode o God. Rather
than removed or set over creation,
God is in, with and under all thatis creaturely. Despite all the nega-
Does the snow o Lebanon
leave the crags o Sirion? Do
the mountain waters run dry,
the cold fowing streams? But
my people have orgotten me
(Jer 18:14-15a).
Creation is the theater oGods grace.5
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
tivitiessuch as the disruption and
destruction occurring due to climate
changewe still trust that God is
at work in this world, oten hiddenbeneath its opposite.
This is also at the heart o what Lu-
ther meant by a theology o the cross:
God is neither to be seen nor sought
behind creation nor inerred rom it,
but only recognized in and through it.
The cross reveals how radically Godis immanent in creation.
Throughout the history o the church,
there have been many debates as to
what is most central about God. For
some, Gods almighty power has been
key, while or others it is Gods ever-
lasting love. For Lutherans and many
other Christians, what is most impor-
tant is that God is love. God seeks to
be in intimate relation with what God
has created, including human beings:
being withrather than being above
or distant rom creation.
It is the Spirit o God (ruach)who con-
veys this sense o intimacy between
God and creation. God is alive and ac-
tive as the Spirit, giving lie to all that
is. Gods breath expresses Gods lie-
creating, lie-preserving goodness.
The Spirit o God is the inexhaust-ible, ever-creative power o God, the
The awesome secret o cre-
ation is the indwelling o God
within it.6
Through the theology o the
cross the suering in and o
the world is recognized as the
locus o Gods creative work.7
Why have some
sought to separate
God rom creation,
as i God needed to
be protected in this
way?
The Psalmist praises God:
you ride on the wings o the
wind you make springs
gush orth in the valleys ... you
cause the grass to grow or
the cattle when you send
orth your spirit (or breath)
they are created; and you
renew the ace o the ground
(Ps 104:3, 10, 14, 30).
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God,CreationandClimateChange
that is at stake (Rom 8), not redemp-
tion from creation.
Gods labors o creation, preserva-tion, and redemption are not three
separate or separable works but a
single labor, whose object is precisely
the birthing o the world that God
intends. God is in labor in the world,
or the world, that it might become
what, in its conception, it is.11
In other words, God is the source,
power and goalthe spirit that
enlivens the complex processes o
creation. God is the source o all be-
ing rather than one who intervenes
rom outside. This is how theologians
such as Sallie McFague reer to God:
as the inspirited body o the whole
universe, creating, guiding and sav-
ing all that is. Rather than assum-
ing God to be like a will or intellect
ordering and controlling the world,
God is the breath that enlivens and
energizes the living breathing planet.
God permeates, suers with and en-ergizes the innermost aspect o all
that is created, in ways known and
unknowable, in ways that are both
intimate and transcendent.12 We can
only grateully receive rather than
solve this mystery.
Picturing Gods activity in suchorganic ways is more appropriate
What does this
imply or how we
might address or
reer to God?
Refect on how olk
wisdom or spiritu-
al traditions have
shaped you. Is this
what you heard in
church? Why orwhy not?
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than in machine like ways, which
have compounded the problems we
ace today. The machine model as-
sumes that rational control is what isimportant, with God as the ultimate
fxer. Instead, the ocus shits rom
control to relationshipsinterde-
pendent relationships throughout all
o creation.
This is similar to how many indig-
enous traditions and aiths haveviewed the relationship between God
and creation. The interdependence
o everything has been common
knowledge throughout most o world
historyall the relationships neces-
sary or lie to ourish, including the
predictability o the climate. Many in-
digenous peoples have long assumed
such an ecological vision o lie, in
contrast to perspectives which value
human lie at the expense o other
orms o lie.
Taking creation seriously as Gods
abode means that the physical spaceo creation becomes important. This
spatial dimension has long been cel-
ebrated, or example, in the Psalms:
How lovely is your dwelling place,
O Lord o hosts! even the spar-
row fnds a home at your altars.
(Ps 84:1-3). We dwell in God who
surrounds us, rom beore and be-yond all time: Lord, you have been
In the Circle o Lie o ab-
original peoples o North
America, the circle symbolizesthe undamental harmony
and wholeness that exists
between all created be-
ingsincluding animals and
birds, trees and stoneswith
solidarity, reciprocity, respect
and love. We all belong to
a great community where
everything is interconnected
and interdependent.
What are some
o the interrela-
tionships in cre-
ation that climatechange is making
us more aware o?
In the Tanzanian village o
Ngola, people believe God is
angry because o the cutting
o the traditional orests where
people used to go or prayers
and rituals. (Tanzania)
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our dwelling place in all generations.
Beore the mountains were brought
orth, and ever you have ormed
the earth and the world, rom ever-lasting to everlasting you are God
(Ps 90:1-2).
The incarnationGod becoming ully
human in Jesus o Nazarethis the
clearest testimony to Gods intimate
relationship with what is created. In
him, divinity and humanity, heavenand earth are brought together. The
central estivals o the church year
emphasize this in powerully poetic
and symbolic ways. At Christmas,
heaven and nature sing as a bright
star in the heavens is linked on earth
with a lowly manger. On Good Friday,
God is revealed in the One who su-
ers and dies with all o creation, and
at Easter, heaven and earth exult
with the living God. At Pentecost, the
wind o the Spirit blew rom heaven,
empowering those in the early
church to communicate across their
earth-bound dierences.
In Arica, the philosophy o
ubuntu, which reers especial-
ly to relations human beings
have with each other, rec-
ognizes that the community
also includes animals, plants
and the rest o creationall
contribute to the communitys
well-being.
In the beginning was the
Word, and the Word was
with God, and the Word was
God And the Word be-
came fesh and lived among
us (Jn 1:1, 14).
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LWF/D.-M. Grtzsch
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In recent centuries in the West, and
throughout much o the world today,
the above perspectives have been
overshadowed. Some human beings
have acted as i they were demigods
who can order and control, or theirown sel-interests, the land, trees, air,
water and other creatures, including
vulnerable human communities. This
oten occurs in the name o develop-
ment or progress. The air, water,
soil and plants are valued in so ar as
they will urther human development
or progress, rather than because o
their own intrinsic worth. The ac-
cumulation o money and goods has
displaced the liberating economy o
the Creator, based on synergy, coop-
eration and lie-enhancing justice or
all o creation.
Consequently, the delicate interrela-
tionships within creation have been
upset. Creations protest is now being
experienced through climate change.
Being creatures within creation is at
the core o a Christian anthropology.
However, many human beings havelost the sense o being part o a living,
The greatest cause o natures
disintegration is humanitys
seeming inability to under-
stand its essential solidarity
with all other orms o lie,
and to act upon that under-
standing.
IV. So what abouthuman beings?
Because o the incred-
ible progress in technology,
people tend to orget about
the most organic, most basic
things, such as responsibility
or the uture generations,
relationships, and, o course,
God. We used to rely on thewisdom o older people, but
nowadays or the younger
generations who are in
charge, there is less need or
God, or any other transcen-
dent values. People tend to
think they are able to achieve,
learn and discover anything
they want all by themselves.
(A youth rom Poland)
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changing, dynamic cosmos, which
has its being in and through God.
Based on the two creation stories inGenesis 1 and 2, human beings have
oten assumed themselves to be the
crown o creation, or the main purpose
or which God created everything else.
This has been due to misunderstand-
ing the call to have dominion over
(Gen 1:28) in ways that have led to the
exploitation o creation, rather than asense o responsibility and account-
ability or what God has created. In
Genesis 2, in the midst o the plants
and water o the garden, God orms the
frst human being rom the dusty earth
and breathes lie into adam. Tilling
and keeping the gardencultivating
and preserving Gods creationis
the mandate given to humans. Human
beings are to be servants o the rest o
creation, not its rulers. This is similar
to how in Mark 10:41-45, Jesus calls
the disciples to ollow him by serving
rather than ruling over others.
Assuming human beings are separate
rom or above nature can imply a
complete reedom o action toward
creationusing or exploiting it in
ways that serve human ends, or as
raw material or human sustenance
and aggrandizement.15 Instead, cre-
ation has a dignity and purpose thatgoes beyond human purposes.
Living a selsh liestyle and
wasting natural resources
breaks the bond between hu-
manity and God, but also be-
tween humanity and the rest
o Gods creation. (Estonia)
We live in patterns o inter-
connection that are both
personally enlivening, and
in common with all that is
creaturely.1
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Sin and salvation are both spiritual
and earthly matters; they have to do
with how we relate to the orms o
Gods presence we encounter in ourdaily, ordinary lives.16 Sin is our ailure
to live out o the relational matrix we
share with the rest o creation and
with God. It is our reusal to remove
ourselves rom the center o the world.
We attempt to escape our creature-
hood and the relationships and vo-
cation that belong to it. Sin is livingalsely, contrary to the appropriate
relationships that constitute reality.
When relationships are violated, in-
justice, abuse and destruction result.
Sin is reusing to accept the limits and
responsibilities o our place within
the whole o creation.
Environmental exclusion in the
orm o exile is a core theme o the
Old Testament, and it speaks to the
condition o those millions who are
already fnding they are orced to
migrate rom their ancestral lands
because o drought and ood causedby climate change.18
The writings o the Old Testament
Prophets repeatedly remind us that
God will not tolerate injustices in-
icted on other human beings and on
the rest o creation, through dominat-
ing power, control and oppression.However, in many o these passages
Unless we recover a sense o
human beings being a part o
the rest o creation, we shall
only accomplish a sucient
cleaning up o industrial pro-
cedures to secure prots and
a reasonably comortable lie
or one generation or so, and
ail to penetrate the heart o
the problem.1
The earth lies polluted under
its inhabitants; or they have
transgressed laws, violated
the statutes, broken the ever-
lasting covenant (Isa 24:5).
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where God responds to injustice, God
is depicted as an all-controlling male
ruler or warrior who acts in punitive,
violent, destructive ways. The prob-lem is that this legitimizes rather than
transorming patterns o violence
against humanity and creation.
The power to change the injustices
should be consistent with Gods over-
all purpose o restoring and trans-
orming creation. Carol Dempseyindicates how this is conveyed in
especially chapters 42, 49, 52, 53, 61
and 65 o the Book o Isaiah:
(1) The redemption o humankind is
connected to the restoration o cre-
ation; (2) the human community has
a responsibility toward all creation;
(3) the vision o Isaiah 65:17-25 can no
longer remain apocalyptic or escha-
tological but must become a reality
or the planet and lie on the planet;
(4) the divine vision or all creation
is one that speaks o respect or all
o lie and lie lived in balance andrelationship.The ocus must shit
rom the use o power to dominate,
control and oppress to the use o
power to empower onesel and others
and liberate all o creation rom its
groaning and oppression.19
The call to repentance in Mark 1:15can be heard as a call to return to a
I will make or you a covenant
on that day with the wild
animals, the birds o the air,
and the creeping things o the
ground, and I will abolish the
bow, the sword and war rom
the land; and I will make you
lie down in saety (Hos 2:18).
For I am about to create
new heavens and a new
earthno more shall the
sound o weeping be heard
in it, or the cry o distress.
They shall build houses and
inhabit them: they shall plant
vineyards and eat their ruit.
They shall not hurt or destroy
on all my holy mountain
(Isa 65:17; 19; 21; 25).
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
proper relationship with the Creator
and creation, a call to be liberated
rom our human perceived need to
be God, and instead to assume ourrightul place in the world as humble
two-leggeds in the circle o creation
with all the other created.20
Given the kairos o climate change
today, there is an urgent need or
repentance or conversion.
We need to shit rom:
Human independence, to human
interdependence with the rest o
creation
Making separations based on
oppositions and dualisms, to em-
phasizing interrelated balances
and connections
Technological control, to respect
or, care and balanced use o cre-
ation and its resources, including
through appropriate technologies
Creation as only the backdrop
or human worship, to creation
pulsating with lie, pathos and
worship o God
An exclusive ocus on God active
in human history, to God activein, with and through the spatial
Suppose we really believed
that the rape o the earth is
blasphemous! 1
Return to the Lord you God,
or God is gracious and
merciul, slow to anger, and
abounding in steadast love,
and relents rom punishing
(Joel 2:13).
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realities o the whole creation, in
which humans participate
A predominantly Christocen-tric ocus on the redemption o
human beings, to Trinitarian
thinking that takes more seri-
ously creation, the Spirit and the
interrelationships throughout the
cosmos, with all o creation as the
scope o redemption
Sin only as a broken relationship
between humans and God, to the
sinul ways relationships with
creation are broken
Gods grace separate rom nature,
to Gods grace known in, with,
through and transormative o
nature
Transcendence that is spiritual-
ized and removed rom the lie and
matter o creation, to a sense o
the divine mysteriously active in,
with and through what is created
An obsession with progress and
development as measured in eco-
nomic terms, to what will result
in more sustainable lie or all o
creation
Allegiance to the global marketsystem, to being inspired by a
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vision o Gods economy or the
sake o the well-being o all, in-
cluding earth itsel
A ocus only on technological or
market-base fxes, to the healing
o creation.
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More than 60,000 people are estimated to have been displaced by the oodin Sunsari district, south-east Nepal, September, 2008. LWF/DWS Nepal
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Gods anger leads not to judgment but
to redemption, not just o human be-
ings, but o all creation: the creation
itsel will be set ree rom its bondage
to decay and will obtain the reedom
o the glory o the children o God
(Rom 8:21). Because o Gods trans-
orming grace, rather than because
o ear, we are empowered to change
our attitudes, liestyles, and prac-
ticesto put things right again. The
way things are now cannot continue
with business as usual. Instead, the
God o grace who is active through,
with and in nature, is revealing how
urgent it is to recover the spiritual
signifcance o valuing our common
good with the rest o creation.22
In the ourth century, St Ambrose
wrote, For the mystery o the Incar-nation o God is the salvation o the
whole o creation.23 Salvation is the
direction o creation, and creation
is the place o salvation.24 In other
words, the health and well-being o
all o creation is what salvation is
about. Christs liberating, healing and
inclusive ministry takes place in andor creation. In Christ, God identifes
V. The redemptiono all creation
For the creation waits with
eager longing or the reveal-
ing o the children o God; or
the creation was subjected to
utility, not o its own will but
by the will o the one whosubjected it, in hope that the
creation itsel will be set ree
rom its bondage to decay
and will obtain the reedom
o the glory o the children o
God (Rom 8:19-21).
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with all suering bodies, including the
suering o creation itsel.
This cosmic scope o Christ is com-municated especially in Colossians 1.
The horizon o salvation or redemp-
tion or reconciliation is widened
signifcantly here. Its ocus is not on
human beings; in act, they are not
even mentioned in this passage. In-
stead, celebrated here is the intimate
relation o Christ and the whole ocreation, rom beore the dawn o
time. The ullness o God comes to
dwell bodily in creation. The powers
o this world are put in their place,
and broken relationships throughout
creation are restored or reconciled.
Similarly in Romans 8, salvation not
only includes human beings but the
whole cosmos. Creation itsel longs or
the revealing o those who, through
the power o the Spirit, will rescue the
whole created order, and bring about
that justice and peace or which the
whole creation yearns. This builds onthe biblical promise o a new heaven
and earth (Isa 65 and 66) and on the
creation story in which human beings
are to be caretakers o creation. The
reedom or which creation longs will
come about through human agents,
transormed by the Spirit, to bring
wise, healing and restorative justiceto the whole creation.25
Is this dierent
rom your under-
standing o salva-
tion? How?
... or in him all things in
heaven and on earth were
created, things visible and
invisible, whether thrones or
dominions or rules or pow-
ersall things have been cre-
ated through him and or him.
He himsel is beore all things
and in him all things hold
together. For in him all the
ullness o God was pleased
to dwell, and through him
God was pleased to reconcile
all things, whether on earthor in heaven, by making
peace through the blood o
his cross (Col 1:16-17; 19-20).
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In the earthly lie o Jesus as recorded
in the Gospels, we see one who was
continually challenging the tradi-
tional dualisms by which people livedtheir lives: male over emale, rich over
poor, humans over nature. His com-
passionate love and justice embraced
all o creation, leading him to cross all
kinds o boundaries o his day.
Similarly, climate change trans-
gresses boundaries, o both naturaland human-defned separations, o
communities, o nation-states, o
lands, o waters, o near and distant
neighbors, o rich and poor, o di-
erent cultures, o the past and the
uture. Many o its eects know no
boundaries. Climate change reminds
us that we are all in this together. It
is the uture o lie on the planet that
is at stake. Yet some bear the brunt
and the consequences ar more than
others, and are ar more vulnerable.
Under climate change, nature has
become the new poor, as vulner-
able and expendable as poor humanbeings and communities have been.
This is where our attention and prior-
ity especially needs to be.
The church is ar more than a just
another actor in civil society or
addressing climate change. It has a
global even cosmic expanse, crossingboundaries o both space and time. It
Refect on exam-
ples in the Gos-
pel where Jesus
crossed boundar-
ies such as these.
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includes those who are contributing
most dramatically to climate change
as well as those rendered most vul-
nerable by it; together they are inter-connected and transormed into each
other, as members o one communion.
The communion o saints crosses all
boundaries o timethose in the past
and in the present as well as uture
generations whose very possibilities
or lie are being jeopardized by cli-
mate change.
Furthermore, through the Sacra-
ments, Gods promises become tan-
gible through common elements o
creationwater, bread, and wine
through which we are redeemed,
nourished and empowered. We are
redeemed by God not apart rom
but through what is created. We
have been washed in the waters o
redemption in baptism and ed with
the bread and wine o Holy Commu-
nion. Through these Sacraments, the
lie-sustaining power o Gods prom-
ises is eected in us, as a oretaste othe east to come. The church bears
witness to the new creation, as a
communion, as the body o Christ in
the world that God has created and
will bring to ulfllment.
Living out o this present and uture
reality, Christians should be at theoreront o redressing the eects
Understanding the intercon-
nections o the carbon cycle
o the planet means that all
actions are interconnected by
their eects on the carbon
cyclethe spiritual solidarity
o the people o God across
space and time.26
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God,CreationandClimateChange
and changing the course o climate
change.
We are challenged to see newpossibilities or reconciliation
and restoration within creation,
in ways that will beneft all rather
than just a ew.
The reality o Gods redemption
is lived out as we pursue greater
justice or all. It does not sufceto address the crises evoked by
climate change through short-
term fxes or solutions that only
reect the same old paths o eco-
nomic and human progress which
have brought us to this point.
We must move beyond narrow
anthropocentric views o lie, and
embrace more interconnected
views in which God, human be-
ings and the rest o creation are
intimately related.
When we do so, the injusticesimposed on other communities or
other realms o creation become
all too apparent, as well as our
capacity or putting things right
again, in communion with the rest
o creation.
The whole will have achieved
the consummation that is in-
tended only when this errant,
pathetic, tragic and much
loved creature nds again
its rightul place among the
creatures.
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God,CreationandClimateChange 1
1 At www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/earth/climate/cli_eects.
html&edu=high
2 Agbonkhianimeghe E. Orobator, Theology Brewed in an African Pot(Maryk-
noll: Orbis, 2008), p. 146.
3 Steven Bouma-Prediger and Brian Walsh,Beyond Homelessness (Grand Rap-
ids: Eerdmans, 2008), p. 33.
4 Steven Bowman-Prediger and Peter Bakken (eds),Evocations of Grace: The
Writings of Joseph Sittler on Ecology, Theology and Ethics (Grand Rapids: Eerd-
mans, 2009), p. 104.
5Ibid., p.157.
6 Larry Rasmussen and Cynthia Moe-Lobeda, The Reorm Dynamic, in Karen L.
Bloomquist and John R. Stumme (eds), The Promise of Lutheran Ethics (Minneapolis:
Fortress, 1998), p. 136.
7 Vtor Westhelle, The Scandalous God(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), p. 104.
8 Hymn 682 in With One Voice: A Lutheran Resource for Worship (Minneapolis:
Augsburg Fortress, 1995).
9 Michael Welker, God the Spirit(Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004), p. 334.
10 Catherine Keller The Flesh o God in Darby Kathleen Ray (ed.), Theology
That Matters (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2006), p. 96.
11 Douglas John Hall,Professing the Faith (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1993), p. 167.
12 Sallie McFague, The Body of God: An Ecological Theology(Minneapolis: For-
tress, 1993), esp. pp. 145; 147.
13 Hall, op. cit. (note 11), p. 337.
14 Welker, op. cit. (note 9), p. 160.
15 Hall, op. cit. (note 11), p. 167.
16 McFague, op. cit. (note 12), p. 114.
Notes
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17 Sittler (1970) in Bouman-Prediger and Bakken, in op. cit. (note 4), p. 80.
18 Michael S. Northcott,A Moral Climate: The Ethics of Global Warming(Maryk-
noll: Orbis, 2007), p. 161.
19 Carol J. Dempsey, The Prophets: A Liberation-Critical Reading(Minneapolis:
Fortress, 2000), p. 179.
20 George Tinker,Spirit and Resistance: Political Theology and American Indian
Liberation (Minneapolis: Fortress, 2004), p. 113.
21 Sittler, op. cit. (note 17), p. 211.
22 Rolita Machila, Why are Earth and God Angry? issue 20 (August 2008) in
the LWF Thinking It Over series; available at
www.lutheranworld.org/What_We_Do/Dts/DTS-Welcome.html
23 Exposition o the Christian Faith, V, VIII, 105b.
24 McFague, op. cit. (note 12), p. 180.
25 N. Thomas Wright, in The New Interpreters Bible, vol. 10(Nashville: Abing-
den 2002), pp. 596-7
26 Northcott, op. cit. (note 18), p. 163.
27
Hall, op. cit. (note 11), p. 322.
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God,CreationandClimateChange
AppendixWhat do you see, eel, believe in the aceo climate change?
An LWF survey (2008)
What is different today?In recent years, what general changes
have you noticed in the climate in your area? How is this aecting
the land, the plants, the air, the animals and the people? What is
dierent rom what your parents or grandparents experienced?
Who?Who or what is especially aected by these changes? Whoespecially bears the burden? Who or what is especially respon-
sible or climate change?
Why? How do people explain these changes? Why are they hap-
pening? (The stories or olk wisdom as well as more scientifc
explanations.)
What has gone wrong?In the relationship between human beings
and the rest o creation? In the relationship between people? In
the relationship with God?
God?How do you eel God is related to or involved in this? What
questions would you pose to God? How is your aith in God a-
ected? What spiritual resources do you draw upon?
The future?How do you view the uture, or your community,
coming generations, and the earth as a whole? What do you ear
or hope or? What spiritual resources do you draw upon?
Solutions?What needs to change in your society? What trade-os
are there? What is being done that can make a dierence? What
local solutions would you propose?
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The Lutheran World Federation
A Communion o Churches
150 route de Ferney
P.O. Box 2100
1211 Geneva 2 Switzerland
Tel. +41/22-791 61 11
Fax +41/22-791 66 30
info@lutheranworld.org
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