The day of reckoning is upon us
* Preach to the converted
* Crucify creation
* Pray for the end
‘Be fruitful and multiply and fill the Earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish in the sea, over the birds of the air and over every living thing.’
Genesis 1:28
And there you have it. The Lord orders Adam and Eve, frankly, to let rip. The world, the message is clear, is theirs for the taking. They are the masters of their universe. Now, whether He intended the latter-day Adams and Eves to vanquish the dodo, concrete over ancient peat bogs, scythe down the Amazon, and generally run amok is a question of interpretation. But your interpretation says very much yes.
In a way that politicians can only dream of, religion exerts the power to fundamentally change people’s behaviour. Followings of billions mean that believers are the largest massed constituency on earth. Some spoilsports moan about religion being the root of all problems. Nonsense. Religion is a darn good thing and, for your purposes, well, you could hardly ask for more. Your view might, of course, change if religious leaders were to start urging believers to adopt a radical, eco-friendly way of being. But for now – and pray let it continue – they have failed to put the environment’s protection at the core of their moral teachings.
Almost miraculously, religious leaders have remained practically silent or inconsistent on arguably the biggest issue in mankind’s history. True, there are a few readings here and there but, largely, they have kept mum on species extinction, ecological degradation, and the general good work you’ve been presiding over for some time now. If you are to keep on track, you need religion, if only to help justify humanity’s rightful dominion over all things winged, four-legged, or coated in bark. If the planet reaches the stage where the world’s population worships the earth as God, then you can say amen to any pretence of wholesale destruction. Religion needs to keep underlining human’s rightful place in the planet’s pecking order – at the top, looking down on the land he has made his own, a land where Man himself plays God. And plays hard.
Annoyingly, the US evangelical Christian movement has emerged to warn of the need for action to curb climate change. But, actually, this isn’t a bad thing. You had hoped that, if any religious movement was going to wade into the debate, it would be this lot. Most people you know cannot take these guys seriously. Instinctively, most do the opposite of whatever they say. Even honourable member US president George Bush feels they may have pushed the boat too far this time, and has opted to ignore their demands to introduce a mandatory limit on fossil-fuel emissions.
For millions there can be no greater turn-off for reducing climate change than siding with such minds. This gang, you hope, could help to further derail the integrity of the entire environmental lobby. History shows that, once they pronounce something as good or bad, they’ll push it as far as possible. Hence, environmentalism is labelled ‘creation care’. What else can we expect? Lynching for homeowners who have sub-standard loft-insulation? The electric chair for anyone who grills rather than toasts their daily bread? The stocks for anyone attempting to turn their (bottled) water into wine? Already they have launched a natty little campaign: ‘What would Jesus drive?’, which strikes you as rather a dumb question. Any chap able to walk on water can pretty much travel as he wants.
But, tempting as the promotion of these lot is, your job is to spread the word of an even more useful wing of America’s evangelists. With consummate timing, a fortunate schism has appeared within the right-wing arm of evangelism. On the one hand you have those pushing to halt climate change, and on the other those who are desperate to damn well ramp up global warming as quickly and as furiously as possible. If it’s a case of choosing teams, you know who you’re batting for. Your new friends are called the ‘End-timers’. After careful deliberation, they have adopted the non-debatable truth that climate change is part of the prophetic prediction of the gospel. Yep, they argue that believers should burn as much fossil fuel as possible in order to hasten the second coming of Christ. By caning the planet you create instant salvation. Simple. They celebrated the Asian tsunami and Hurricane Katrina with the zeal of those on the fast escalator to ‘im Upstairs. Perhaps, you wonder, their anti-abortion credentials might stem from the knowledge that, the more people consuming the planet, the quicker they’ll arrive at the gates of heaven. You must make contact with these people; make them your disciples. You doubt that anyone will work harder to f**k the planet than this little gathering.
Closer to home, things are more measured. The Archbishop of Canterbury, head of the Church of England, faced with the weight of scientific evidence that climate change is advancing, did what any clear-headed religious head would do in the face of such a monumental challenge to the natural order. He ordered a green audit of his parishes forthwith. Not content with such draconian gestures, he released ‘How Many Light Bulbs Does it Take to Change a Christian?’ (£4.99 from all good Christian bookshops). There is no punchline. This, after all, is no time for idle frippery. And give or take a few well-intentioned earnest gestures, that’s about your lot. Rowan Williams may have warned in his Christmas 2007 speech that the planet is not a warehouse for your greed, but one is tempted to wonder who is really listening.
Some of his colleagues can appear a little more inspiring. True, the Bishop of London blotted his copybook by condemning flying as a sin, but then he atoned by abandoning his flock during the most important week in the Christian calendar to take his wife on a paid-for ocean-liner cruise worth £7,000. One hopes that Richard Chartres actually knew that large cruise ships emit almost double the carbon-dioxide emissions per passenger per mile than a long-haul flight. Maybe he didn’t care.
And so on to Catholicism, which, frankly, has umm-ed and ah-ed about the issues of environmentalism, and whose leader spent a couple of gratifying years in the post of Pope before deigning to utter the words ‘climate change’. Pope Benedict XVI’s predecessor, though, was more your kind of person. With the social mores of a billion followers under his influence, he simply did the right thing by electing to avoid the issue altogether – although it must be said that Pope John Paul II failed to sidestep the strictures of tokenism and did end up installing low-energy light bulbs in the Vatican. Even so, you feel confident that the religion of Catholicism remains in fine shape for your purposes. Perhaps he just wanted to avoid fading the photo-sensitive frescos. And when Vatican officials were asked in 2006 whether they had invested in any coal or oil companies, instead of looking shocked and spluttering a forthright ‘How dare you?’, no one seemed to have a clue.
Islam seems even more of a boon. Few argue that environmental concerns have yet to progress beyond infancy. For starters, it’s quite tricky to reconcile the return air flight to Mecca with followers’ carbon footprints, and impossible to quell the pervading belief that environmental destruction is a by-product of the rich Christian West. For the majority of Muslims, Islam is more than a cultural or political identity. Religion matters, a lot. Yet look closely and green themes emerge from within the Quran. For a start, it mentions that ‘the sun and the moon follow courses precisely reckoned and the stars and the trees bow themselves in adoration and the heavens, God has raised them up, and set a balance. Transgress not in the balance.’ To transgress this balance is to commit a crime against God. You are concerned that Islamic teachings may one day utilize such phraseology.
You also fear Hinduism and the fact that some of its gods are part-animal, such as Ganesh, the elephant-headed deity. Yet you note with satisfaction that, in India, the Asian elephant is on its uppers and that the sub-continent seems to be riddled with an incredibly healthy fatalism as far as Armageddon is concerned. India is due to be one of the great polluters this century and has dedicated just 0.2 per cent of its budget to forest and wildlife conservation. Such a philosophical outlook can be critical in achieving environmental breakdown. In a bonkers, misfiring planet, people will eventually have to accept that what happens is God’s will after all. ‘Chill out – the big man knows what he’s doing,’ they will say when the sky comes crashing down. As your plan takes shape, people must be sanguine enough to accept the inevitable catastrophe with a shrug of the shoulders.
And so that leaves the newest faith of all and the one you most hope will succumb to the altar of hypocrisy. Its converts are everywhere: you can spot them loitering beside the organic avocados at the supermarket, fiddling with their Fair Trade cardies. They belong to the new C of E, the Church of Environmentalism. Their recycled lives are governed by the concept of energy efficiency and good turns. While you plan to bring pestilence, war, famine, and degradation to the planet, death by boredom appears to be their chosen means of departure.
* Archbishop of Canterbury rails against the ‘wasteful’ West in Christmas 2008 sermon. Certainty.
* Extremist Islamic preachers blame the EU and the US for using climate change against them in the holy war. Likely.
* The Popemobile is converted into a six-cylinder drag racer using biofuels. Unimaginable.
* Evangelical ‘End-timers’ caught on tape celebrating a killer tornado across the mid-west. Plausible.
* Archbishop of Canterbury denounces the ‘greed and moral vacuum’ of the West in Christmas 2009 speech. Certainty.
Likelihood of the environment becoming a central tenet of religious teaching by 2015: 42%