Atheists would not say ‘God made the earth so he should look after it’ because they do not believe in God made the earth; many atheists believe in the Big Bang Theory. Some non-believers may, however, say that they are not particularly concerned about the environment. Such an approach might well be more a lack of knowledge about how serious some of the problems are. Others might just have a ‘live for today’ attitude. They might think “I’m alright. There will be enough petrol and greenery in the world whilst I am alive, and global warming is not goin to affect me”. With education, such people might change their views.
The main enemies of the environment are some of the big money-grabbing businesses. Such businesses exploit the environment in order to maximise their profits. For example, many clothing and shoe businesses have factories in third world countries, and employ the people in the area. This could come across as a good thing at first glance, but many of these people are being paid ridiculously small amounts of money for manufacturing products that are being sold elsewhere for hundreds of pounds each. In this way, these companies are taking advantage of the less fortunate people in the world in order to make a larger profit for themselves.
Christians believe that the very first law given to humanity, as soon as the first human was created in the image of God, was that they should be ‘stewards’ of the earth. A steward is someone who carefully looks after something that is not theirs; they look after it to the best of their ability for its owner, who in this case is God. Some have interpreted the Creation story as giving people the right to exploit the environment, but most Christians would disagree with this, as they believe that in Genesis 1 and 2 rights are balanced against responsibilities; they believe that they are in charge of all living things that have been made on the earth, but they do not own them, as God says:
“Let us make man in our image, in our likeness, and let them rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air, over the livestock, over all the earth, and over all the creatures that move along the ground…”
(Genesis 1: 26-31)
Some of the rules of the Old Testament are about good stewardship; for example, rules are given about harvesting. In Old Testament times, ‘gleaning’ was a common practice. After a field had been harvested, any grain which had fallen on the ground or which had been missed by the harvesters was left for the poor, who would be allowed to go and collect it for their own use:
“When you are harvesting in your field and you overlook a sheaf, do not go back and get it. Leave it for the alien, the fatherless and the widow, so that the Lord your God may bless you in all the work of your hands… Remember that you were slaves in Egypt. That is why I command you to do this…”
(Deuteronomy 24: 19-22)
The law reminds people not to insist on taking every last scrap for themselves; they should make sure that they leave something behind for the people who will come after them.
Personally, I strongly believe that if God exists and he did create the world, then it is still Man’s responsibility because he left it in our charge. I think Genesis 1:26-31 proves that God gave the earth to the human race as a responsibility and not a right. Also, I believe that all of human kind has a responsibility to take care of itself and all of those concerning it, and by helping to conserve the environment we are keeping the world a beautiful and healthy place for future generations to live in and care for.
