November 21, 2009
I have decided to bring this project to a close. I still think the idea of an online book discussion is worth pursuing, but am not sure that this was the ideal book to get us going. I find myself no closer to having passion for environmental issues than I did at the beginning. I am however still just as committed to the idea that we are to be stewards of creation. I will continue to try and remember to turn off the tap when I brush my teeth, support sustainable development and the like, all the while hoping that the work of ethicists and politicians can help us get to grips with what is going on in China and elsewhere.
In Chapters 10 and 11, Jenkins moves toward ideas of ecological spirituality and draws deeply on Eastern traditions, who following Maximus work for “reuniting nature and humanity within a cosmic economy of deification.” This is set over and against a perception that Western tradition has separated nature from salvation. (p.189) The theologians cited here push toward an articulation of the cosmic dimensions of salvation in ways that I find intuitive and congenial. It makes sense to me that our interconnectedness with all of creation means that what is going on in my life has something to do with whatever is going on on Mars and vice versa.
Jenkins does explore the avenues of wisdom in the tradition and the intriguing idea of ‘practicing transfiguration’, which seems to mean the conscious narration of nature’s glory. (p.222)
In his conclusion, Jenkins reiterates that he is about the task of “rendering environmental problems urgent and intelligible to Christian communities…Moreover, insofar as ecologies of grace illuminate how environmental problems matter for Christian life, this book shows why ecology makes a claim on Christian identity, and how environmental crises could pressure change in the way churches tell their salvation stories.” (p.228)
For clergy, he specifically invites renewed reflection on the pastoral dimensions of ‘nature and grace’, on the ecological dimensions of the experience and telling of salvation. He sees the tasks of lament and discourse about sustainability going hand in hand. (p.234)
He signals how theologians are affected in their understanding of grace by such things as hierarchies with respect to gender for example and how a shift in understanding grace in one conversation will lead to new resources and views in another. (p.240)
I’m left grateful for this work, left with a deeper understanding of some of the theological and ethical issues in this field, left with remaining questions about the status of nature and disease with attempts to ’personify’ creation, and a continuing hope that there is something for Christians beyond oughts and should, but not persuaded of that as ye
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Ecologies of Grace, Chapters 8 & 9
November 20, 2009
So from Aquinas we move to Karl Barth and the idea of stewardship after the end of nature. Jenkins looks to Barth to discover whether stewardship “remain a structurally dominant relation”. Instead of granting some privileged moral position to ‘nature’ this strategy starts from God’s claim on human action. (p.153) He then goes into a spirited defense of Barth who is usually used as a foil by environmental ethicists. Barth insists on the revelational priority of act over being. God’s act determines created reality, in both time and space, history and geography. And third, we know God’s act through the particular event of Jesus Christ. “God’s universal will is elective, revealed in and bound to a particular creature.” (p.155)
Barth ends with a stewardship of earthkeeping or caring for creation on one hand and a stewardship of wise use; earthly perception on one hand and hearing the voice of God on the other. (p.169)
In chapter 9 we go on to consider how, for Barth, Christ’s work makes the ’special place of human obedience’ (p.171) and are led down yet another theologically dense and abstract path to consideration of “the environment of Jesus”. This is brought back toward normal human experience in consideration of Barth’s inversion of ‘Servant as Lord and Lord as servant’ leading to the danger of anthropomorphism in consideration of ‘Humans as Lords.’
There is a great deal of material in these chapters as in those that have gone before that suggest that they are for the cognoscenti of environmental ethics and are mining Christian theologians for resources that might be helpful. I’m a fairly simple soul at one level and find it easy enough to say that God made the heavens and the earth and saw that it was good. That, of course raises the problem of evil which many theologians have reduced to being a consequence of a cosmic fall by which death is introduced to the Garden of Eden. I find the Thomistic approach more helpful than anything Barthian with his suggestion that there is something to be learned about what is of true and ultimate worth in this world through the reality of suffering. It does not excuse God from charges of setting up a world in which many creatures suffer and sometimes for the apparent good of others, but offers another way of thinking about them as moral issues. Based on that, of course we must care for creation, but are the theologians and ethicists helping us know what that means? I can see that our harmful emissions in the developed world are part and parcel of drought and starvation in other parts of the world and that must be addressed as a matter of ethics. I’m not so clear that we shouldn’t evaluate cost and benefit of ding such things as building levees in New Orleans, --clearly a manipulation of ‘nature’. So far in this book, I’m not being taken much further, but find myself glad that those called to this care and concern are going about it thoughtfully and carefully.
So from Aquinas we move to Karl Barth and the idea of stewardship after the end of nature. Jenkins looks to Barth to discover whether stewardship “remain a structurally dominant relation”. Instead of granting some privileged moral position to ‘nature’ this strategy starts from God’s claim on human action. (p.153) He then goes into a spirited defense of Barth who is usually used as a foil by environmental ethicists. Barth insists on the revelational priority of act over being. God’s act determines created reality, in both time and space, history and geography. And third, we know God’s act through the particular event of Jesus Christ. “God’s universal will is elective, revealed in and bound to a particular creature.” (p.155)
Barth ends with a stewardship of earthkeeping or caring for creation on one hand and a stewardship of wise use; earthly perception on one hand and hearing the voice of God on the other. (p.169)
In chapter 9 we go on to consider how, for Barth, Christ’s work makes the ’special place of human obedience’ (p.171) and are led down yet another theologically dense and abstract path to consideration of “the environment of Jesus”. This is brought back toward normal human experience in consideration of Barth’s inversion of ‘Servant as Lord and Lord as servant’ leading to the danger of anthropomorphism in consideration of ‘Humans as Lords.’
There is a great deal of material in these chapters as in those that have gone before that suggest that they are for the cognoscenti of environmental ethics and are mining Christian theologians for resources that might be helpful. I’m a fairly simple soul at one level and find it easy enough to say that God made the heavens and the earth and saw that it was good. That, of course raises the problem of evil which many theologians have reduced to being a consequence of a cosmic fall by which death is introduced to the Garden of Eden. I find the Thomistic approach more helpful than anything Barthian with his suggestion that there is something to be learned about what is of true and ultimate worth in this world through the reality of suffering. It does not excuse God from charges of setting up a world in which many creatures suffer and sometimes for the apparent good of others, but offers another way of thinking about them as moral issues. Based on that, of course we must care for creation, but are the theologians and ethicists helping us know what that means? I can see that our harmful emissions in the developed world are part and parcel of drought and starvation in other parts of the world and that must be addressed as a matter of ethics. I’m not so clear that we shouldn’t evaluate cost and benefit of ding such things as building levees in New Orleans, --clearly a manipulation of ‘nature’. So far in this book, I’m not being taken much further, but find myself glad that those called to this care and concern are going about it thoughtfully and carefully.
Ecologies of Grace, Chapters 6 & 7
November 20, 2009
From here Jenkins takes us into theological resources looking first at St. Thomas Aquinas. Jenkins view is that Thomas manages to combine empirical aspects of Aristotle with the mystical ascent and proclamation of the love of God found in Augustine. He sees the whole of nature seeking its fulfillment in God and so ‘sanctifies biodiversity’. He sees Thomas as setting apart specifically human practices, not in the cause of anthropocentrism, but in order to “explain creation’s common ordination to God.” (p.118) Every creature has specific but fundamental relation to the creator. This raises the question for me as to whether a lion is ‘being natural’ when it tears apart its prey for supper. While clearly part of ‘biodiversity’, is that part and parcel of ecojustice and if so, how?
Part of the answer emerges as Jenkins explicates Thomas thus: “Creatures represent divine perfection as they act for their proper ends, realizing the real relation to their creator that lies at the heart of their existence by realizing the natural perfections that govern the form of their essences.” (p.122) Creation includes “ordered unity and “real diversity” (p.123) and God’s grace uses creation to perfect humans among other things.
When Jenkins moves on to chapter 7 he begins by asking how ecological habits of friendship with God respond to natural evils. Once again we go off down a trail of learning to perfect our praises by understanding distinctiveness. Our naming of the animals in the garden is not so much dominion as recognition. (I confess as an aside that I am questioning the wisdom of trying to generate an on line discussion using this book as it is dense, complex and not yet taking me to an understanding of the environmental movement at an existential level.)
Thomas is clear, apparently, that God does not will natural evils as ‘privations for particular creatures’ (p.144). In the end it seems that natural evils function “to tutor charity in perceiving the lovable”. In other words evil is somehow brought in to the service of good. As theodicy, this does not really satisfy, but on the level of a spiritual response to God, I can affirm it.
In conclusion Jenkins summarizes Thomas saying “In Christ, all creation comes to God through God’s friendship with humanity.” An interesting reading of Thomas but hardly compelling enough to get rid of Styrofoam cups. What say you?
From here Jenkins takes us into theological resources looking first at St. Thomas Aquinas. Jenkins view is that Thomas manages to combine empirical aspects of Aristotle with the mystical ascent and proclamation of the love of God found in Augustine. He sees the whole of nature seeking its fulfillment in God and so ‘sanctifies biodiversity’. He sees Thomas as setting apart specifically human practices, not in the cause of anthropocentrism, but in order to “explain creation’s common ordination to God.” (p.118) Every creature has specific but fundamental relation to the creator. This raises the question for me as to whether a lion is ‘being natural’ when it tears apart its prey for supper. While clearly part of ‘biodiversity’, is that part and parcel of ecojustice and if so, how?
Part of the answer emerges as Jenkins explicates Thomas thus: “Creatures represent divine perfection as they act for their proper ends, realizing the real relation to their creator that lies at the heart of their existence by realizing the natural perfections that govern the form of their essences.” (p.122) Creation includes “ordered unity and “real diversity” (p.123) and God’s grace uses creation to perfect humans among other things.
When Jenkins moves on to chapter 7 he begins by asking how ecological habits of friendship with God respond to natural evils. Once again we go off down a trail of learning to perfect our praises by understanding distinctiveness. Our naming of the animals in the garden is not so much dominion as recognition. (I confess as an aside that I am questioning the wisdom of trying to generate an on line discussion using this book as it is dense, complex and not yet taking me to an understanding of the environmental movement at an existential level.)
Thomas is clear, apparently, that God does not will natural evils as ‘privations for particular creatures’ (p.144). In the end it seems that natural evils function “to tutor charity in perceiving the lovable”. In other words evil is somehow brought in to the service of good. As theodicy, this does not really satisfy, but on the level of a spiritual response to God, I can affirm it.
In conclusion Jenkins summarizes Thomas saying “In Christ, all creation comes to God through God’s friendship with humanity.” An interesting reading of Thomas but hardly compelling enough to get rid of Styrofoam cups. What say you?
Ecologies of Grace, Chapter 5
November 19, 2009
Ecological spirituality asks questions such as ‘what is the value of this world?’ and ‘what is the place of humans, as both physical and spiritual creatures, in the created world?’ (p.93) A variety of approaches to this strategy, “each makes environmental issues matter for Christian experience by appealing to the ecological dimensions of fully Christian personhood.” They seek to articulate a radical relation of personhood and environment. While my pulse is not quickening as I read, I can get with this program a little more readily through remembering Ortega’s line from Meditations on Quixote, namely, “I am myself plus my circumstance.” Of course our environment is critical to and shapes who we are becoming. This strategy seems to have most in common with Eastern themes of deification and ‘the cosmic significance of personal communion’ and the like.
Jenkins takes us through various approaches to creation spirituality and what he dubs ‘sacramental ecology’, including one of my favorites: Teilhard de Chardin and his ‘spiritual cosmology’ seen through the lens of human evolution. He eventually comes to the question as to what all this transforming creativity of God is directed? (p.107) Without a clear answer as yet he heads into a survey of Eastern Orthodox thought and leaves us with the suggestion that ’wisdom’ or Sofia might be a fruitful path of enquiry.
Having surveyed the various ‘strategies’ and theological resources within them, I am still not persuaded that there is any other way for us to look at ‘nature’ except through human eyes. While that need not lead to a kind of irredeemable anthropo-centrism allowing us to use the resources of nature with no regard for ecosystems and other creatures , for example, I find it impossible to get my mind around the idea of some kind of ‘personhood[‘ or its equivalent being ascribed to ‘creation.’ The strategy that makes the most sense to me is that of stewardship as part and parcel of living into right relationship with God and all that God has made. Where do you find yourself amongs all these options presented thus far?
Ecological spirituality asks questions such as ‘what is the value of this world?’ and ‘what is the place of humans, as both physical and spiritual creatures, in the created world?’ (p.93) A variety of approaches to this strategy, “each makes environmental issues matter for Christian experience by appealing to the ecological dimensions of fully Christian personhood.” They seek to articulate a radical relation of personhood and environment. While my pulse is not quickening as I read, I can get with this program a little more readily through remembering Ortega’s line from Meditations on Quixote, namely, “I am myself plus my circumstance.” Of course our environment is critical to and shapes who we are becoming. This strategy seems to have most in common with Eastern themes of deification and ‘the cosmic significance of personal communion’ and the like.
Jenkins takes us through various approaches to creation spirituality and what he dubs ‘sacramental ecology’, including one of my favorites: Teilhard de Chardin and his ‘spiritual cosmology’ seen through the lens of human evolution. He eventually comes to the question as to what all this transforming creativity of God is directed? (p.107) Without a clear answer as yet he heads into a survey of Eastern Orthodox thought and leaves us with the suggestion that ’wisdom’ or Sofia might be a fruitful path of enquiry.
Having surveyed the various ‘strategies’ and theological resources within them, I am still not persuaded that there is any other way for us to look at ‘nature’ except through human eyes. While that need not lead to a kind of irredeemable anthropo-centrism allowing us to use the resources of nature with no regard for ecosystems and other creatures , for example, I find it impossible to get my mind around the idea of some kind of ‘personhood[‘ or its equivalent being ascribed to ‘creation.’ The strategy that makes the most sense to me is that of stewardship as part and parcel of living into right relationship with God and all that God has made. Where do you find yourself amongs all these options presented thus far?
Ecologies of Grace, Chapter 4
November 19, 2009
“In contrast to the ecojustice focus on creation’s integrity, the strategy of Christian stewardship frames environmental issues around faithful response to God’s invitation and command.” (p.77) The status of nature within this strategy is that it is the environment of God’s love for the world, which good stewards inhabit responsibly. Any dominion over the realm of afforded humanity in this strategy is clearly understood as for the purpose of caring for the whole of creation, almost as God’s deputies in the matter.
Stewardship ethicists argue that we only encounter the nature constructed in our encounter with God. And there God confronts humanity with its disordered practices and calls them into authentic freedom. (p.82)
This strategy offers various models of redemption all of which lead to the question as to whether nature itself needs to be redeemed and what that might or could mean. Answers vary depending on how corrupt ethicists of this camp believe nature to be as a result of sin. In any event “stewardship theologies claim that redemption brings environmental issues under Christ’s lordship.” (p.92)
Does anyone have anything to bring to this discussion that redeems a stewardship strategy from being another set of ‘oughts’ and ‘shoulds’, even if these are a response to tasting the first fruits of salvation?
“In contrast to the ecojustice focus on creation’s integrity, the strategy of Christian stewardship frames environmental issues around faithful response to God’s invitation and command.” (p.77) The status of nature within this strategy is that it is the environment of God’s love for the world, which good stewards inhabit responsibly. Any dominion over the realm of afforded humanity in this strategy is clearly understood as for the purpose of caring for the whole of creation, almost as God’s deputies in the matter.
Stewardship ethicists argue that we only encounter the nature constructed in our encounter with God. And there God confronts humanity with its disordered practices and calls them into authentic freedom. (p.82)
This strategy offers various models of redemption all of which lead to the question as to whether nature itself needs to be redeemed and what that might or could mean. Answers vary depending on how corrupt ethicists of this camp believe nature to be as a result of sin. In any event “stewardship theologies claim that redemption brings environmental issues under Christ’s lordship.” (p.92)
Does anyone have anything to bring to this discussion that redeems a stewardship strategy from being another set of ‘oughts’ and ‘shoulds’, even if these are a response to tasting the first fruits of salvation?
Ecologies of Grace, Chapter 3
November 19, 2009
From here the book seems to pick up the pace a bit. “The strategy of ecojustice organizes Christian environmental ethics around the theological status of creation.” (p.61) Moral respect for nature is drawn into a wider narrative (and God saw that it was good.) Discussions of justice lead to discussions or environmental sustainability and human dignity. Jenkins surveys various ecojustice ethicists and suggests that they transform the similar and secular strategy. The integrity (with its ethical consequences) of creation is discerned through Christian spiritual practice through which we come to understand something of God’s relation to the world. (p.66)
One challenge of this strategy relates to uncertainty about the role nature might play to form humanity into intimacy with God. A second relates to how we are to understand those aspects of nature that are possibly signs of nature’s degeneracy rather than integrity. What are we to make of earthquake pestilence famine and flood? Is the human suffering caused by these ‘natural occurrences part of the consequence of the fall or are they something to be included in a full account of what God created?
From here the book seems to pick up the pace a bit. “The strategy of ecojustice organizes Christian environmental ethics around the theological status of creation.” (p.61) Moral respect for nature is drawn into a wider narrative (and God saw that it was good.) Discussions of justice lead to discussions or environmental sustainability and human dignity. Jenkins surveys various ecojustice ethicists and suggests that they transform the similar and secular strategy. The integrity (with its ethical consequences) of creation is discerned through Christian spiritual practice through which we come to understand something of God’s relation to the world. (p.66)
One challenge of this strategy relates to uncertainty about the role nature might play to form humanity into intimacy with God. A second relates to how we are to understand those aspects of nature that are possibly signs of nature’s degeneracy rather than integrity. What are we to make of earthquake pestilence famine and flood? Is the human suffering caused by these ‘natural occurrences part of the consequence of the fall or are they something to be included in a full account of what God created?
Ecologies of Grace, Chapter 2
November 18, 2009
In this chapter Jenkins pursues criteria for what makes an environmental ethic ‘practical’ and suggests that a synthesis of the three schools or strains of ethics would provide a guide to some minimal standards of practicality. The challenges he sees to practicality are first a deep pluralism of viewpoints, and second the tendency to deal with that pluralism by finding an ‘unjustified keystone’ (p.39) or some other organizing principle that cannot contain the breadth of argument and therefore fails to persuade in a practical direction.
In addition to and partly as a result of practical questions, a second ‘clue’ emerges. As he puts it: “By consistently associating the ‘practical’ with social experience, pragmatists draw attention to the way ethical concepts make environmental issues morally significant within patterns of personal and social experience.” (p.40)
He spends the rest of this chapter describing proposals with a view to their ‘mutual intelligibility’ around a) nature’s standing; b) human agency; and c) ecological subjectivity.
With respect to Nature’s Standing: Some argue for an ethic based on some intrinsic value to nature dependent on neither an anthropocentric slant (i.e. justifying Nature’s value in relation to human life) nor an economic justification (i.e. nature is valuable in economic terms such as sustainability for life in the long run).
With respect to Moral Agency: ethicists seek to overcome problems of direct appeal to nature’s standing. An example comes from Steven Vogel. When the ethicist shows “the extent to which the world we inhabit is already humanized” she makes us “see the world we inhabit as something for which we are responsible, in both the causal and the moral sense of that word.” In turn we realize that we “produce the world through our practices and can change it only by changing those practices.” (cited on p.50) This collection of strategies begins by evaluating models of environmental Practice in their sociopolitical contexts. (p.51)
With respect to Ecological Subjectivity: the environment is considered as reciprocal subject (presumably in contrast to object of human activity). The diverse schools of thought within this strategy all know that “an environmental ethic must account for the ecological dimensions of human personhood. (p.57)
I confess that my lack of familiarity with this field of environmental ethics is making this heavy going for me and I have to work constantly to try and understand what is at stake in the various theories. Even when I think I understand the nuances of the various ethical approaches, I am still a long way from connecting these theories with my on existence except n a theoretical sense. Yes I am bound up with and shaped by my environment even as I in turn shape it by the way I live. Suggesting that I am, or ought to be, in ‘dialog’ with nature really doesn’t take me anywhere. I have no objection to the concept but am no closer to heartfelt caring in a way that makes this a priority for me or a compelling appeal. It all seems to be above my pay grade and I hope the people who have apparently managed to ensure that no new or significant accords will come from the Copenhagen meeting know what they are doing. Jenkins does help me grasp that ‘the debates’ about differing ethical premises can easily lead to inaction.
Can anyone help me with good questions after reading this chapter?
In this chapter Jenkins pursues criteria for what makes an environmental ethic ‘practical’ and suggests that a synthesis of the three schools or strains of ethics would provide a guide to some minimal standards of practicality. The challenges he sees to practicality are first a deep pluralism of viewpoints, and second the tendency to deal with that pluralism by finding an ‘unjustified keystone’ (p.39) or some other organizing principle that cannot contain the breadth of argument and therefore fails to persuade in a practical direction.
In addition to and partly as a result of practical questions, a second ‘clue’ emerges. As he puts it: “By consistently associating the ‘practical’ with social experience, pragmatists draw attention to the way ethical concepts make environmental issues morally significant within patterns of personal and social experience.” (p.40)
He spends the rest of this chapter describing proposals with a view to their ‘mutual intelligibility’ around a) nature’s standing; b) human agency; and c) ecological subjectivity.
With respect to Nature’s Standing: Some argue for an ethic based on some intrinsic value to nature dependent on neither an anthropocentric slant (i.e. justifying Nature’s value in relation to human life) nor an economic justification (i.e. nature is valuable in economic terms such as sustainability for life in the long run).
With respect to Moral Agency: ethicists seek to overcome problems of direct appeal to nature’s standing. An example comes from Steven Vogel. When the ethicist shows “the extent to which the world we inhabit is already humanized” she makes us “see the world we inhabit as something for which we are responsible, in both the causal and the moral sense of that word.” In turn we realize that we “produce the world through our practices and can change it only by changing those practices.” (cited on p.50) This collection of strategies begins by evaluating models of environmental Practice in their sociopolitical contexts. (p.51)
With respect to Ecological Subjectivity: the environment is considered as reciprocal subject (presumably in contrast to object of human activity). The diverse schools of thought within this strategy all know that “an environmental ethic must account for the ecological dimensions of human personhood. (p.57)
I confess that my lack of familiarity with this field of environmental ethics is making this heavy going for me and I have to work constantly to try and understand what is at stake in the various theories. Even when I think I understand the nuances of the various ethical approaches, I am still a long way from connecting these theories with my on existence except n a theoretical sense. Yes I am bound up with and shaped by my environment even as I in turn shape it by the way I live. Suggesting that I am, or ought to be, in ‘dialog’ with nature really doesn’t take me anywhere. I have no objection to the concept but am no closer to heartfelt caring in a way that makes this a priority for me or a compelling appeal. It all seems to be above my pay grade and I hope the people who have apparently managed to ensure that no new or significant accords will come from the Copenhagen meeting know what they are doing. Jenkins does help me grasp that ‘the debates’ about differing ethical premises can easily lead to inaction.
Can anyone help me with good questions after reading this chapter?
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