A Greener Faith Religious Environmentalism and Our Planet's Future

by Gottlieb, Roger S.

• ISBN13: 9780195176483
• ISBN10: 0195176480
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-06-15
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

In a time of darkening environmental prospects, frightening religious fundamentalism, and moribund liberalism, the remarkable and historically unprecedented rise of religious environmentalism is a profound source of hope. Theologians are recovering nature-honoring elements of traditionalreligions and forging bold new theologies connecting devotion to God and spiritual truth with love for God's creation and care for the Earth. And religious people throughout the world are transforming the meaning of their faiths in the face of the environmental crisis. The successes and significanceof religious environmentalism are manifest in statements by leaders of virtually all the world's religions, in new and "green" prayers and rituals, and in sophisticated criticisms of modern society's economy, politics, and culture. From the Evangelical Environmental Network to the Buddhist primeminister of Mongolia, the National Council of Churches to tree-planting campaigns in Zimbabwe, religious environmentalism has become a powerful component of the world environmental movement. In A Greener Faith, Roger S. Gottlieb chronicles the promises of this critically important movement, illuminating its principal ideas, leading personalities, and ways of connecting care for the earth with justice for human beings. He also shows how religious environmentalism breaks the customaryboundaries of "religious issues" in political life. Asserting that environmental degradation is sacrilegious, sinful, and an offense against God catapults religions directly into questions of social policy, economic and moral priorities, and the overall direction of secular society. Gottliebcontends that a spiritual perspective applied to the Earth provides the environmental movement with a uniquely appropriate way to voice its dream of a sustainable and just world. Equally important, it helps develop a world-making political agenda that far exceeds interest group politics applied toforests and toxic incinerators. Rather, religious environmentalism offers an all-inclusive vision of what human beings are and how we should treat each other and the rest of life. Gottlieb deftly analyzes the growing synthesis of the movement's religious, social, and political aspects, as well as the challenges it faces in consumerism, fundamentalism, and globalization. Highly engaging and passionately argued, this book is an indispensable resource for people of faith,environmentalists, scholars, and anyone who is concerned about our planet's future.

Author Biography

Roger S. Gottlieb is Professor of Philosophy at Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Worcester, Mass. Among his many books are This Sacred Earth: Religion, Nature, and Environment, now in its Second Edition, A Spirituality of Resistance: Finding a Peaceful Heart and Protecting the Earth and Joining Hands: Politics and Religion Together for Social Change.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION Religion and the Human Meaning of Environmental Crisis	3	(16)
CHAPTER 1 Religion, Nature, Environment	19	(38)
CHAPTER 2 Religious Environmentalism and Secular Society	57	(24)
CHAPTER 3 Sustainable Religion	81	(30)
CHAPTER 4 Religious Environmentalism in Action	111	(36)
CHAPTER 5 Environmentalism as Spirituality	147	(26)
CHAPTER 6 Opening the Heart: The Ritual Life of Religious Environmentalism	173	(20)
CHAPTER 7 Five Faces of Religious Environmentalism	193	(22)
CHAPTER 8 Obstacles, Prospects, Hope	215	(30)
NOTES	245	(36)
INDEX	281