There have been many books I have read that have caused me to stop and ponder, some have caused me to understand another view, and some have caused me to wonder why they were ever written. Few books have ever caused me to alter my view of myself and the world around me. One of those books was entitled, “Ishmael” by Daniel Quinn. The synopsis of the book and the series is that there are two types of people who have inhabited the earth, they are “takers” and leavers”. The takers believe that that the earth was created for man to conquer and to rule over. They believe that everything on the earth is theirs for the taking and the destroying in pursuit of man’s God given status. The leavers believe that man is just one part of the earth and not the end all, be all. The leavers believe that we as men have an obligation to care for the earth and its inhabitants and to live in it in a way to try and disturb it as little as possible.
The 80-year-old Pope said the world needed to care for the environment but not to the point where the welfare of animals and plants was given a greater priority than that of mankind.
The German-born Pontiff said that while some concerns may be valid it was vital that the international community based its policies on science rather than the dogma of the environmentalist movement.
The leader of more than a billion Roman Catholics suggested that fears over man-made emissions melting the ice caps and causing a wave of unprecedented disasters were nothing more than scare-mongering. The Daily Mail
The sad thing about the takers is that they are everywhere. They have permeated every level of society and they espouse all types of beliefs. Takers can be Christians, Communists, Capitalists, Socialists, Libertarians, Agnostics, Atheists, or any other sect, denomination or political affiliation. The difference between the takers whether they are capitalist or communists is not the use or destruction of the resources, but the distribution of that destruction. Both believe that it is man’s to do as he pleases and if nature gets in the way, then nature has to go.
The reason that I am singling out the Pope is because of what he represents to so many people. The Pope for many people is the human representative of God on this earth, so he carries a lot of weight. For this man to come out and basically declare the destruction of the earth at the hands of man “scare-mongering” is more than I can take quietly. If he were just some old man giving his personal opinion that would be one thing, but when you have a billion people listening to your every word then I would have hoped he would have chosen them more wisely. By doing so, he is giving the other takers of this world spiritual cover, the same type of spiritual cover that was given to the invaders that destroyed indigenous people all over the world in the name of progress and conversion and the same type of cover that allowed the Nazis to ethnically cleanse Europe.
The Pope would have us to believe that the world is man’s to destroy if he chooses and that the other things that the same God that created him created are less than man and thus can be extinguished for the good of mankind. What the Pope and the other takers have failed to realize is that we live in an ecosystem and if you destroy one part of it you weaken and eventually destroy all the other parts. Man cannot subsist in the world without the rest of the environment being intact, if that were in fact the case why are the other plants and animals here? I don’t know what Bible the Pope reads, but the one I read says that man is to tend the earth and be a steward. Does a steward destroy the thing he was given to protect and take care of?
The second problem I have with the Pope is his reliance on science over God. He states that the world should rely on the opinion of science to make its decisions, well Pope if that were in fact the case you would be out of a job. Science does not support the existence of God or the Bible, so here you have a man who is sworn to uphold the word of the Bible and he is asking us to believe those who have done all in their power to destroy the word of the Bible. I’m sorry but I am a little confused. If the scientists say that we can destroy the earth with no repercussions we should believe them, but if they say that the Bible is a lie we should not believe them? So when it is convenient or when they justify the superiority of man we are to follow their opinions.
This is precisely the problem with the modern Church, they have come to rely too much on the wisdom of man and they are following the world. Instead of leading the world to peace, tolerance, and love of our fellowman, the Church has become the home of intolerance, bigotry, and hatred. Our temple has been turned into a “den of thieves” and a home of hypocrites. According to the takers there is only one right way to live, their way. I disagree.
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion, but not their own facts. – Daniel Patrick Moynihan