Theology & Ecology - Rev. Billy Kristanto & Mr. Sonny Sutanto

Session 1 - Pdt. Billy Kristanto

I. Discouragement

These are several discouragements we commonly face towards the ecological mandate:

1. Eschatological Discontinuity

The eschatological discontinuity is a thought that the new heaven and earth are complete new, in a way that the eschatological heaven and earth have nothing to do with the present ecology. We might have heard people say, "it's OK for this world to be distorted for God will replace it with a new one. If I try to fix the ecology, I will lose against the people who don't care about the ecology anyway".

Lutheran eschatology emphasizes on eschatological discontinuity, unlike Reformed eschatology, though we see both aspects in the Scripture. But we would like to emphasize on our responsibility towards the ecology, because what we sow here on earth—which we believe also as the kingdom of God—will God cultivate and He will reckon our participation if we do all things according to His Word.

2. Platonic Soteriology

The Platonic Soteriology states that we should not care of anything material. The opposite, Theo-Platonic states otherwise, that what matter are the things invisible, spiritual, and not even the physical self. We believe both thoughts are heretical, for we claim to believe in the resurrection of the body in the Apostle's Creed.

3. Individual Redemption (instead of cosmic)

We believe that God’s redemption works towards mankind. However, the idea of an individual redemption is against the notion that the whole creation is being “redeemed” as well. The Scripture says that “[…] the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now” (Romans 8:22), yearning for His redemption. We read in Paul’s epistle that he talked of the cosmic redemption, and not mere individual redemption. The human soul, body, as well as the whole creation must be redeemed. This is why we might be familiar with the terms redeemed music, redeemed art, and so on.

4. False Reception of Humankind as the Crown of Creation

Lynn Townsend White Jr. proposed a thesis that one of the ideologies that causes ecological crisis is the Christian belief, because Christianity teaches that we are the crown of creation, hence having the power to destroy nature.
But we know that this is a wrong interpretation of the Christian theology. We must be careful not to twist Christianity to destroy ecology.

5. Modern Cartesian Objectification of Nature

According to René Descartes, we are subjects that think and the things outside the subjects that think are called objects. Men have consciousness to think of the things we thought of. Descartes are not even talking about mere nature, he also meant our physical bodies being objects.

This subject and object relationship is problematic in Christianity. In the Christian theology, we always view everything in relation to each other: the relationship between the mind and the body, the relationship between men and the relationship between men and lower creations.

Descartes objectification seemed as if he was creating a distance that leads us to assess matters objectively. This idea can affect how we treat nature. If you consider your body as mere object, you would us your body the same “way” with the way you use your pen. This is a highly utilitarian thought.

6. Enlightenment: Mechanical View of the World

Descartes lived in the Baroque era, when rationalism and mechanical view of things raised to popularism. The opposite of mechanical view is organic view. For example, in the movie ‘Avatar’, there are men in trees, and trees in men. This idea opposes the mechanical view, but it is also an un-Biblical thought.

II. Encouragement

1. Nature as General Revelation of God

We believe in general revelation and special revelation. What crosses our minds when we discuss of the general revelation is God’ s provision of nature. Then why do we feel terrible tearing off the pages of the Bible, which we believe to be a special revelation, and not feel bad tearing off trees for no good reason?

2. Presence of God (context-sensitive!)

God is present everywhere, even in the most distorted places and false churches. Berkoff stated that because God is omnipresent, He is present in men as well as animals, though His presence are different in men than animals. Alike, God is present in both rightful churches and false churches.
Therefore, we must protect and preserve wherever God may be present! We cannot pay attention to places where we believe God to be most certainly present, like the church, and not care of the wild forest where God seems to be less present.