Climate Disasters and Religious Absurdities
- Article Published At:
- Rutland Herald-Times Argus
- Date of Publication:
- July 2nd, 2022
Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere have risen to nearly 421 ppm, 50% higher than the 280 ppm in the pre-industrial era. We need to stand up and openly confront (with humor if possible) the many dark sides of our society that work to increase atmospheric CO2. There are many groups based on the abuse of human power which refuse to protect people and the living creation.
Almost everywhere we look, consumer advertising, lying politicians and amoral capitalism are trying to make money from destroying the planet. The Republican Party is still accepting bribe money from the fossil fuel companies to deny climate change, as part of this criminal attempt to destroy planet Earth for profit.
The U.S. has had record wildfires this year as temperatures rise with rising CO2, followed by regions of record exceptional drought from Texas, New Mexico, Utah and Nevada, to California. Reservoir levels are critically low and threaten water supplies and power generation. In contrast, the Yellowstone region in northern Wyoming had extreme flooding earlier this month with river levels 2.5 feet higher than ever recorded. This flood caused massive damage to roadways, and isolated some communities.
In a sane world, these climate change costs would all be directly billed to the criminal oil companies and politicians. Another idea might be to mandate that lying politicians and oil company executives work for a month every summer as firefighters.
In the global world, fascist Putin is bombing Ukrainian cities and murdering tens of thousands of civilians and soldiers, sadistically trying to capture this former part of the Soviet empire by destroying it. Sadly, there are corporate leaders, fearful of falling profits and the loss of their fossil fuels, arguing that Ukraine should “negotiate” by surrendering territory. Russia cannot be trusted since they did not keep a similar deal made seven years ago. Since they have now resorted to even more sadistic war crimes, this appeasement is beyond stupid, but it is connected to our global fossil fuel addiction.
Capitalism and the fossil fuel empire are obsessed with current profit, and destroying life on Earth (including our children) is just a future byproduct. So the real living Earth system, the creation itself which is responsible for all life on Earth, is taking over the climate system and targeting our human infrastructure. The indigenous Aramaic speaking Yeshua (known to us as Jesus) always backed the creation over human power and human rulers, so one might think that Christian religions would follow.
Sadly, the reverse is true. Amoral capitalism leans for support on religions, where power is often protected by its own webs of lies. For example, the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) pretend their opposition to women’s rights is Christian, even though the indigenous Jewish teacher Yeshua clearly respected all women at a time when their rights were very limited. In the SBC, congregations that appoint female ministers are expelled. In contrast, male clergy that sexually abuse and rape teenage girls and young women are protected, and put on a secret list with currently 700 clergy. If an abused women or a congregation protests, the clergyman can be moved to a new church with fresh innocent women and girls to be sexually abused. Clearly, the SBC is run by male chauvinists who have rejected the teachings of Jesus. Instead, this anti-Christian, neo-fascist organization pressures right-wing politicians to take away the rights of women.
Locally in the Northeast, the United Methodist Church has wonderful loving outreach programs that feed and help people. However, a separate Global Methodist Church is being launched, led by theologically conservative Methodists. Stripped of their euphemisms, theological conservatives are male-chauvinist echo chambers, who reject LGBTQ inclusivity in the church, including same-sex marriage and gay ministers. Essentially, they flatly oppose the indigenous teachings of Christ to love everyone; and hate progressive reconciling congregations as “non-traditional.”
Here we see the continuation of the dark side of Christianity, which is more than a 1,000 years old. For many centuries, male Catholic priests supervised the killing of millions of indigenous people; in fear because they had a much better understanding of the teachings of the indigenous Jesus and to seize their land. Of course, the Roman Catholic Church from the very beginning was created in direct opposition to the teachings of the indigenous Yeshua. The indigenous Aramaic teachings were destroyed at the Council of Nicea in 325 A.D. and replaced with a simple creed that met the human power needs of the Imperial Roman Emperor. For 1,700 years, Earth has suffered immensely from the subsequent abuse of human power. It is bizarre that the Roman church has never accepted responsibility for its anti-Christian and anti-creation power structure, even though Pope Francis appears to understand it.
Now, the living Earth, the creation, simply says: “Embrace the indigenous view and rejoin creation, or lose the industrial world to climate catastrophes.” Our rulers and corporations are lying in a desperate effort to conceal this truth, but this is the truth that will set us free.