Readers of a certain ilk may recognise the reference to an album from the aged rock group Supertramp: ‘Crisis? What crisis?’ The picture on that album ironically captured a man sunbathing with icons of industrial waste in the background.
For many today, the American establishment’s refusal to act on warnings of global warming has a similarly absurd, ostrich-like head in the sand feel. It would be funny if it were not so tragic.
Megachurches and the environment
At least, that view of a crisis requiring urgent response is the drumbeat of a new evangelical initiative from some of America’s most prominent megachurch leaders. The web page is http://www.christiansandclimate.org/ and the endorsements come from such leading lights as Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church and author of The Purpose Driven Life. However, this initiative has also stirred up a response, written to the American National Association of Evangelicals to prevent them officially endorsing the Evangelical Climate Initiative (ECA), from luminaries such as James Dobson of Focus on the Family and Chuck Colson, otherwise colleagues and co-labourers with many of the signatories of the ECA.