CAPE TOWN, South Africa (19 October) Christians need to be good stewards of the environment as the world struggles to agree about how to tackle the environmental crisis, a prominent Christian leader has argued.
Speaking at Cape Town 2010: The Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization, this afternoon, Las Newman, President of the Caribbean Graduate School of Theology in Jamaica, called the crisis a ‘stark reality that compels us to act.’
He added: ‘We are believers in a Creator and a Redeemer God and hence have a great responsibility to act on God’s behalf in our world today.’
Dr Newman was speaking at a Multiplex session of the Congress alongside Ken Gnanakan, President of ACTS Group of Institutions in Bangalore, India, which includes primary and secondary schools, colleges and a private university.
They said that acting on God’s behalf must include giving people the right knowledge and skills to combat environmental problems, as well as advocating alternative energy sources and seeking to ensure that each locality was an ‘ideal eco-habitation.’ The speakers also pointed out that the impact of environmental change will be felt most keenly, and potentially catastrophically, in the poorest nations of the world. The one hundred countries most at risk have a combined population of almost one billion people, but produce only 3.2 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions.
‘The climate is changing,’ said Las Newman during a follow-up press conference. ‘Some say it is cyclical, some say it is man-made. Those of us living with the reality of it are “impatient of the debate.” As Christians, we have a moral responsibility to care for creation.’
Arguing for Christians neither to assume the sceptical position, dismissing it as a non-issue, nor to join the ‘prophets of doom who have exaggerated claims for their own personal agendas, Drs Newman and Gnanakan pointed out that Christians had been presented with a real opportunity.
‘In the face of the failure of global leaders to come to any clear solutions, the role of the Christian community becomes even more urgent,’ they said.
‘We must mobilize community awareness, education and action in our immediate communities. And we must set up or support poverty alleviation projects of all kinds to help decrease the gap between the rich and poor.’
Las Newman and Ken Gnanakan were speaking on the second full day of The Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization.
By Carl Laferton