For Earth Day

"Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither." - C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

I meant to post this earlier in the day, in honor of Earth Day, but what with one thing and another...

Lewis' quote above illustrates the main gripe I have with Earth Day and similar things; that it represents such a very earthbound point of view, a spiritual myopia, that contains the seeds of its own failure. Aim merely for earth, and you will end up with nothing in the end, not even earth.

Anyhow, the ever-bombastic Iowahawk is holding his 2010 Earthweek Virtual Cruise-In, in which he publishes entries from his readers, featuring photos and descriptions of some formidible gas-guzzlers. He writes;

In honor of this auspicious occasion, the text for the remainder of the day will be displayed in soothing, energy efficient green -- saving nearly 7000 tons of CO2 emissions. As far as you know.

One reader promises (if he wins this dubious competition) to donate his carbon credits to an orphanage. Don't miss it if you can!

Comments

[Beadgirl]

I don't know that I would describe Earth Day and the environmental movement itself as concerned only with earthly matters and doomed to emptiness. The fact that I tell my kids to eat their vegetables does not necessarily mean I am neglecting their spiritual growth.

[Tim J.]

True enough, Beadgirl, but the environmental movement as a whole certainly leaves me with the impression that the environment, or the planet, is The Most Important Thing There Is... a lot like a secular religion.

Being more than a little influenced by Tolkien, and being a child of God (who, after all, invented the environment) I'm all in favor of rolling back the grievous excesses of the industrial age. But I am also suspicious of the opposite and just as horrid excesses of that kind of environmentalism that would have abortion and suicide the only real duties of mankind. I'm therefore tickled (at times) to see proponents of things like the Carbon Credits scam get a well-deserved poke in the eye.

[Beadgirl]

That's certainly true that there are extremists out there. I remember reading about one person who refused to acknowledge the existence of her sister's second child because she felt no one should have more than 1, for replacement of population not growth (apparently, she was bad at math, too, not just morals).

Interestingly, there are people on the opposite end of the spectrum who are just as disgusted at Carbon Credits as you are, seeing them as meaningless gestures.

[Del]

Environmentalism has become the new gnosticism -- having children is an evil; but infertile sex is a virtue.

But we are strange new gods now, thinking we can control the weather.

[Jeff Hendrix]

Bro Tim, the Lewis quote is specially apropos. Another variant he emphasized was that if one aims for happiness as a telos per se, one will always miss or find mere disappointment. This is specially true for any lesser goal - accruing wealth or carbon credits, sexual partners or even fame as an ascetic. It cuts both ways.

But, Lewis states, if one aims at loving God and loving neighbor in spirit and truth, Joy is the by-product: what we desired and yearned for most of all from the outset.

IMO, this is the same point that he makes in your banner quotation. Cheers/best

[Tim J.]

Hey, all. I am in a location where I can't put up a proper post (the server won't let me into my Typepad account), but I hope to do so tonight. The time I had set aside for blogging this week was swept away by a minor auto emergency/mechanical issue, one of those events that sucks most of an entire day into a completely fruitless and unproductive arrangement of tedious errands, fretting and a lot of standing around.

The upshot: one of our cars is (again) at deaths door. If there were hospitals for cars, ours would be in ICU in a coma.

Things are, ummm... challenging right now. Prayers would be great.