Why Creation Needs the Church
Dr. Richard Gallenstein
Associate Professor of Economics
Director of Master of Public Policy Program
Catholic University of America
Setting the Stage
Global Trends
Trend 1: Global Economic Output
Trend 2: Population Growth
Trend 3: Inequality
Trend 4: Environmental Degradation
Trend 4: Environmental Degradation
Trend 4: Environmental Degradation
Deforestation
Source: Global Forest Watch
”The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth”
~ Laudato Si, 21
Trash Islands
Great Challenges of Our Age
How do we
The World’s “Solutions”
Political Alternatives
Polarized Political Landscape
Liberal / Left
Conservative / Right
A Catholic Response
Biblical Foundation
Genesis – God’s Mission for Humanity
“…God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them; male and female he created them.”
~ Gen. 1:27
In His Image
Genesis – God’s Mission for Humanity
“Then God said, “Let us make humankind in our image, according to our likeness; and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the birds of the air, and over the livestock, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth… God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish in the sea and the birds in the sky and over every living creature that moves on the ground.””
~ Gen. 1:26 , 28
“And YHWH God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and keep it.”
~ Gen. 2:15
“Then the man and his wife heard the sound of the Lord God as he was walking in the garden in the cool of the day…”
~ Genesis 3:8
Genesis – God’s Mission for Humanity
The Garden is a place of meeting between God and humanity (God walked in the garden)
Maintain and cultivate the blessing of the Garden (work it and keep it)
Offer creation back to God in worship (work it and keep it; dominion)
Genesis – God’s Mission for Humanity
The Garden is a place of meeting between God and humanity (God walked in the garden)
Maintain and cultivate the blessing of the Garden (work it and keep it)
Offer creation back to God in worship (work it and keep it; dominion)
Spread the Garden to all of creation (fill the earth and subdue it)
Mission Interrupted
The Fall
🡺 Humanity can no longer fulfill the mission to spread the Garden
🡺 They are exiled from the Garden.
Source: Bible.Gallery
Rescue Operation: The Offspring of the Woman
“And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your offspring and hers;�he will crush your head, and you will strike his heel.”
~ Genesis 3:15
Offspring of the Woman
Rescue Operation: Abraham and Sarah
God invites a new couple (Abraham and Sarah) to a new land.
Promised Land
Rescue Operation: Abraham and Sarah
God raises up a new couple through whom he will launch his rescue mission: Abraham and Sarah. He promises to Abraham:
“I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies, and through your offspring all nations on earth will be blessed, because you have obeyed me.”
~ Genesis 22:17-18
Abraham and his offspring are promised a restoration of the mission
Be Fruitful and Multiply
Dominion / Subdue
Blessing
Spread the Garden
Rescue Operation: Moses
Through Abraham’s descendants, God establishes the nation of Israel.
Israel is invited out of exile to a land that will be the new Garden
The land is “flowing with milk and honey” (Ex. 13:12), a land of blessing
Rescue Operation
Rescue Operation
But God warns Israel, if they fail the mission:
“But if, despite this, you disobey me, … you I will scatter among the nations, … Then the land shall enjoy its sabbath years as long as it lies desolate, while you are in the land of your enemies; then the land shall rest…”
~Lev. 26:27-28, 33-34
The Coming Redemption
Through the prophets, God promises redemption:
“The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is on me because the Lord has anointed me to proclaim good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives and release from darkness for the prisoners, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” ~ Isaiah 61:1-2a
“‘For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.” ~ Ezekiel 36:24-26
Return to the Garden
Return to the Garden
The Messiah and Redemption
“On the Sabbath he went to the synagogue as he normally did and stood up to read. The synagogue assistant gave him the scroll from the prophet Isaiah. He unrolled the scroll and found the place where it was written: The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me. He has sent me to preach good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the prisoners and recovery of sight to the blind, to liberate the oppressed, and to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
~ Luke 4:16-19
Jesus claims his identity as the Messiah, the long-awaited king of Israel and fulfillment of God’s promises.
Isaiah 61!
The Messiah and Redemption
“Jesus called them together and said, “You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their high officials exercise authority over them. Not so with you. Instead, whoever wants to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wants to be first must be your slave, just as the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many.”
~ Matthew 20:25-28
Godly dominion is service!
The Messiah and Redemption
“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
~ Matthew 22:37-39
A core element of Jesus’ teaching is the centrality of love: Love of God and love of neighbor
Source: https://markusray.com/paintings/van-eycks-lamb-of-god/
Source: https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/437172
The Messiah and Redemption
“Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. 17 When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.””
~ Matthew 28:16-20
Jesus’ charge to us is this, that we would carry forward God’s mission to
The Messiah and Redemption
“For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God…”
~ Romans 8:19
All of creation is waiting for us to fully live our identity as Sons of Gods!
Laudato Si
The Problem: Technocratic Paradigm
“This paradigm exalts the concept of a subject who, using logical and rational procedures, progressively approaches and gains control over an external object... It is as if the subject were to find itself in the presence of something formless, completely open to manipulation...”
~Laudato Si (106)
“We must lay aside an individualistic and technical view of humanity, as if reality were mere matter to be shaped according to selfish interests, whether individual or collective.”
~ Magnifica Humanitas (237)
Theme 1: Inherent Dignity of Creation
“Yet it would also be mistaken to view other living beings as mere objects subjected to arbitrary human domination.” (82)
“Our insistence that each human being is an image of God should not make us overlook the fact that each creature has its own purpose. None is superfluous. The entire material universe speaks of God’s love, his boundless affection for us. Soil, water, mountains: everything is, as it were, a caress of God.” (84)
Theme 2: Human Dignity
“This is not to put all living beings on the same level nor to deprive human beings of their unique worth and the tremendous responsibility it entails. Nor does it imply a divinization of the earth which would prevent us from working on it and protecting it in its fragility” (90)
“At times we see an obsession with denying any pre-eminence to the human person; more zeal is shown in protecting other species than in defending the dignity which all human beings share in equal measure.” (90)
Theme 3: Rightly Ordered Authority
Stewardship
Blessing
Left
Right
Theme 3: Rightly Ordered Authority
“[Judeo-Christian thought] emphasizes all the more our human responsibility for nature. This rediscovery of nature can never be at the cost of the freedom and responsibility of human beings who, as part of the world, have the duty to cultivate their abilities in order to protect it and develop its potential.” (78)
Theme 4: Loving Wholistically
“[we] must integrate questions of justice in debates on the environment, so as to hear both the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor.” (49)
“The notion of the common good also extends to future generations. The global economic crises have made painfully obvious the detrimental effects of disregarding our common destiny, which cannot exclude those who come after us. We can no longer speak of sustainable development apart from intergenerational solidarity.” (159)
🡺 To love God and love our neighbor, including future generations, we must love creation!
Theme 4: Loving Wholistically
Love People
Steward Creation
Theme 4: Loving Wholistically
Love People
Steward Creation
Theme 5: Integral Ecology
“When we fail to acknowledge as part of reality the worth of a poor person, a human embryo, a person with disabilities – to offer just a few examples – it becomes difficult to hear the cry of nature itself; everything is connected.” (117)
“we cannot presume to heal our relationship with nature and the environment without healing all fundamental human relationships.” (119)
“We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and environmental.” (139)
Theme 5: Integral Ecology
“Ecological culture cannot be reduced to a series of urgent and partial responses to the immediate problems of pollution, environmental decay and the depletion of natural resources. There needs to be a distinctive way of looking at things, a way of thinking, policies, an educational program, a lifestyle and a spirituality which together generate resistance to the assault of the technocratic paradigm. Otherwise, even the best ecological initiatives can find themselves caught up in the same globalized logic. To seek only a technical remedy to each environmental problem which comes up is to separate what is in reality interconnected and to mask the true and deepest problems of the global system.” (111)
Political Alternatives
Polarized Political Landscape
Liberal / Left
Conservative / Right
Both succumb to the technocratic paradigm
Creation Needs the Church
Why Does Creation Need the Church?
Holistic Worship
The liturgy points us to a life that takes all of the earth as a gift from God and returns it to God as a gift.
Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, for through your goodness we have received the bread we offer you: fruit of the earth and work of human hands, it will become for us the bread of life.
Blessed are you, Lord God of all creation, for through your goodness we have received the wine we offer you: fruit of the vine and work of human hands, it will become our spiritual drink.
Two Roads
Option 1: The World’s Solutions
Option 2: Eucharistic Environmentalism
Stella Maris Institute Events
See stellamarisfamily.org/institute
Thank You
Appendix
Sagrada Familia
A basilica built to reflect creation’s worship of God
Resisting the Technocratic Paradigm
Technocratic Paradigm
This situation has led to a constant schizophrenia, wherein a technocracy which sees no intrinsic value in lesser beings coexists with the other extreme, which sees no special value in human beings.
~Laudato Si (118)
“instead of carrying out his role as a cooperator with God in the work of creation, man sets himself up in place of God and thus ends up provoking a rebellion on the part of nature”
~Laudato Si (117), quoting JPII
Integral Perspective
“Our relationship with the environment can never be isolated from our relationship with others and with God.” (119)
“When human beings place themselves at the center, they give absolute priority to immediate convenience and all else becomes relative.” (122)
“Business is a noble vocation, directed to producing wealth and improving our world. It can be a fruitful source of prosperity for the areas in which it operates, especially if it sees the creation of jobs as an essential part of its service to the common good.” (129)
“It cannot be emphasized enough how everything is interconnected.” (138)
“We are faced not with two separate crises, one environmental and the other social, but rather with one complex crisis which is both social and environmental.” (139)
Integral Perspective
“Each organism, as a creature of God, is good and admirable in itself; the same is true of the harmonious ensemble of organ isms existing in a defined space and functioning as a system. Although we are often not aware of it, we depend on these larger systems for our own existence.” (140)
“The acceptance of our bodies as God’s gift is vital for welcoming and accepting the entire world as a gift from the Father and our common home, whereas thinking that we enjoy absolute power over our own bodies turns, often subtly, into thinking that we enjoy absolute power over creation.” (155)
Relativism
“In the absence of objective truths or sound principles other than the satisfaction of our own desires and immediate needs, what limits can be placed on human trafficking, organized crime, the drug trade, commerce in blood diamonds and the fur of endangered species?” (123)
“when the culture itself is corrupt and objective truth and universally valid principles are no longer upheld, then laws can only be seen as arbitrary impositions or obstacles to be avoided” (123) 🡪 We need conversion!
Theme 1: Rightly Ordered Authority
“[Judeo-Christian thought] emphasizes all the more our human responsibility for nature. This rediscovery of nature can never be at the cost of the freedom and responsibility of human beings who, as part of the world, have the duty to cultivate their abilities in order to protect it and develop its potential. If we acknowledge the value and the fragility of nature and, at the same time, our God-given abilities, we can finally leave behind the modern myth of unlimited material progress. A fragile world, entrusted by God to human care, challenges us to devise intelligent ways of directing, developing and limiting our power.” (78)
“Yet it would also be mistaken to view other living beings as mere objects subjected to arbitrary human domination.” (82)
Major Themes
Situated Anthropocentrism
“let us cultivate what Pope Francis called a “situated anthropocentrism” which recognizes the human being as a creature embedded in a network of relationships with other living beings and with all of creation.”
~ Magnifica Humanitas (237)
Catholic Social Thought
Classical Liberalism
Socialism
Property Rights
Community
Individual
Concentration of Property Ownership
Distributed Ownership
Concentrated Ownership
Environmental Decline
Environmental Decline
Environmental Decline
Summary
Poverty has dramatically declined in the past 5 decades.
The earth has taken a beating at the same time.
🡺 It seems that the cry of the earth is the rejoicing of the poor!
Poverty and Environmental Decline
China Example
East Asia
Is the Cry of the Earth also the Cry of the Poor?
Is the Cry of the Earth also the Cry of the Poor?
Yes
The poor are the most affected by environmental decay
Addressing ecological crises also meets the needs of the poorest
Drivers of Climate Change
Most Vulnerable to Climate Change
An Enormous Pile of Filth?
A Pile of Filth?
”The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth”
~ Laudato Si, 21
”The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth” ~ Laudato Si, 21
Trash Islands
To Work and Keep
Our Practical Response
Work and Keep The Earth
Work and Keep The Earth
The Land is a Mission Field
Compost
Let (some of) your land go fallow
Do you need to mow all of your land?
Start a robust garden
Raise chickens
Plant trees
Fruit trees at the church for the neighborhood?
Shop at a farmer’s market
Work and Keep The Earth
One Example: Compost
Dump 🡺 God’s creation becomes complete waste
Compost 🡺 God’s creation becomes fruitful and bountiful for our own flourishing
The Poor and Our Common Home
Home Energy Use
Look to use less energy
Heat your home at a lower temp
Cool your home at a higher temp
Solar panels
Diet
Eat less meat, especially beef
The Poor and Our Common Home
Transportation Energy Use
Create a plan to drive less
Fuel efficiency
Learn to drive efficiently
More fuel efficient car
Move to proximate community
Create a local family fun plan
Local sports teams
Local family vacations
More fun at home
A Pile of Filth
Recycle
Seriously use/buy less stuff
Think about how much trash you produce
Avoid plastic
Intellectual Life
Check out
New Polity
Laudato Si Action Platform
Laudato Si Movement
Fr. Alexander Schmemann Quotes
�
�
Transcendently Satisfied
World Bank Global Poverty Rate
East Asia
South Asia
Sub-Saharan Africa
Carbon Emissions per Capita