Global Warming: So what can you and I do? The Ledger Independent www.Maysville-online.com Monday, May 8th, 2006 Copyright © 2006 Maysville Newspapers, Inc., A Lee Enterprises Publication Global Warming: So what can you and I do? By The Rev. C. Wayne Barnett Several years ago, I would designate one Sunday as Soil Stewardship Sunday. As a child, I remember seeing a cornfield that had been devastated by soil erosion. The neighboring farmer planted the corn in straight lines rather than on the contour, so it seemed as if half the field washed away. I quit talking about soil erosion because we have so few farmers in our congregation. For some time, I have wanted to talk about not simply the soil but the planet, but the issue seemed so big, why bother. What difference can you and I make in regard to bird flu? What difference can we make in regard to the genocide in Darfur? This year, I wanted to celebrate Earth Sunday. What caught my attention was an article in the April 3 Time magazine written by Jeffrey Kluger. The title of the article read: "Be Worried. Be Very Worried." Here is the first paragraph: " No one can say exactly what it looks like when a planet takes ill, but it probably looks a lot like Earth. Never mind what you've heard about global warming as a slow-motion emergency that would take decades to play out. Suddenly and unexpectedly, the crisis is upon us. It certainly looked that way last week as the atmospheric bomb that was Cyclone Larry -- a Category 5 storm with wind bursts that reached 180 mph -- exploded through northeastern Australia. It certainly looked that way last year as curtains of fire and dust turned the skies of Indonesia orange, thanks to drought-fueled blazes sweeping the island nation. It certainly looks that way as sections of ice the size of small states calve from the disintegrating Arctic and Antarctic. And it certainly looks that way as the sodden wreckage of New Orleans continues to molder, while the waters of the Atlantic gather themselves for a new hurricane season just two months away. Disasters have always been with us and surely always will be. But when they hit this hard and come this fast -- when the emergency becomes commonplace -- something has gone grievously wrong. That something is global warming." Now global warming seems like one of those things I can’t do anything about. It doesn’t seem to be like soil erosion. A farmer can control the way he plows a field, but what can I do about global warming? I can tell you what I can do, I can live in despair about the issue and purchase the biggest pick-up truck that I can afford and not worry that my truck contributes to the problem. I have been hearing about global warming since Margaret Thatcher brought it to the world’s attention in the early 1980s. But I did not pay any serious attention to the issue until I read the Time article. Would you like to know what causes global warming? Here is what the time article says: Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a tiny component of our atmosphere which helps warm the Earth, but too much of it does an awful lot of damage. The gas represents just a few hundred parts per million in the overall air blanket, but they're powerful parts because they allow sunlight to stream in but prevent much of the heat from radiating back out. During the last ice age, the atmosphere's CO2 concentration was just 180 ppm, putting Earth into a deep freeze. After the glaciers retreated but before the dawn of the modern era, the total had risen to a comfortable 280 ppm. In just the past century and a half, we have pushed the level to 381 ppm, and we're feeling the effects. Of the 20 hottest years on record, 19 occurred in the 1980s or later. According to NASA scientists, 2005 was one of the hottest years in more than a century.” If I understand correctly, carbon dioxide plays a major part in the temperature of the earth. It is a by-product of many naturally occurring systems, but the major increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is the result of burning fossil fuel: gasoline and diesel in trucks and cars and coal in power plants. Plants and trees need carbon dioxide for photosynthesis and the by-product of photosynthesis is oxygen, but we don’t have enough trees and plants to absorb the increased CO2 that results from all the fuel we burn. Now I could go on and on listing various problems that the effects of increased CO2 is having on the earth. Some of these would be what is happening in Greenland, the North and South Poles, the disruptions in the weather, the newly created deserts and so on. Just know global warming is a serious problem and scientists are worried. Scientists don’t know how many parts per million of CO2 it will take for the earth to reach a point where our planet will decay beyond recovery, but they know that such a point exists. And right now the industrial nations, the oil and coal industry, the people who fear any kind of economic slowdown all want to keep things going as they are now. So what can you and I do? We read the Genesis scripture because we have understood that scripture to mean that we can do with the earth what we want. But many scholars believe we are to understand that scripture as a declaration that we are in partnership with God. The Adam and Eve story implies that we are responsible for how we treat the earth. And the Noah story reminds us we are in partnership with God, and if not it is to our own peril. I believe God wants us to live in harmony. He wants all the children of the world red, yellow, black, and white to live in harmony. Any religion that does not teach that we are to love God and our neighbor whether the neighbor be red, yellow, black or white is in my view a distortion of what God intends no matter how individuals may choose to worship. We will learn to live in harmony or we will destroy ourselves. One place we need to begin is with the issue of global warming. You see, it makes a difference whether I throw trash out of my car, whether I plow my fields on the contour, whether I drive a big pick-up truck, or whether I recycle my cans and my plastic. I can be responsible about the big issues, and I can speak out so that I don’t live in despair. The Earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it; For he has founded it upon on the seas, and established it on the rivers. Who will ascend the hill of the Lord? And who shall stand in his holy place? Those who have clean hands and pure hearts, who do not lift up their souls to what is false,. . .they will receive blessing from the Lord. (Ps. 24:1-5)