Oh boy, I had a Christian ex-friend get very upset with me for saying Jesus isn't coming back to save the planet, who was of the opinion that my saying everyone needs to get their ass in gear about stopping climate change is disrespecting her beliefs. Ahem. (Thread.)
You know the saying "your freedom to swing your fist ends at my nose"? Yeah, well, if you believe Jesus is coming back soon so climate change doesn't matter and therefore we don't need to do anything to halt/mitigate it, that's fine. You can believe we don't NEED to. But.
There's a difference between "I personally don't believe it's necessary to do this" and "I'm going to try to prevent anyone from doing this." The first is you swinging your fist. When you get to the second, your fist has connected with my nose.
If you believe your Christian eschaton is imminent, fine. Go for it. But here's the thing, thus far, everyone who's believed the end of the world was nigh has been wrong, and if you're wrong, we've all still gotta share our home planet indefinitely.
There's a famous quote whose source is elusive (it appears without attribution in the Reform Jewish siddur, and I've seen it attributed to Ignatius and Augustine too): Pray as if everything depended on God; act as if everything depended on you.
So I gotta reverse Pascal's wager you, then. If you're right and Jesus is coming back in a few months or years or whatever and the world's going to be destroyed, what have you lost if we've taken good care of it? Versus what if you're wrong, and we've made it uninhabitable?
If you believe Jesus is coming back and the world's going to get destroyed, and you have to prove your faith by hastening its human-driven destruction, A) your beliefs are awful, but also B) aren't you usurping the divine role in all of this?
Like, I've read your scriptures, and nowhere does Jesus say, "and verily, when I come back, if y'all haven't fracked this planet into a smoking ruin, I'm gonna be PISSED." If he's a deity, and he wants the world destroyed, he can do it himself.
(Meanwhile, Genesis says we're supposed to work the earth and guard/protect it. Oh, and the word for "work"? Same root as the word for "servant." The verse can be literally translated as "serve and protect.")
So, like, maybe you believe you and the rest our your earthly roommates are about to move out. That's fine. You can believe that. But if you trash the place, you're still a terrible person. And no eschatological beliefs change that. Save. The. Planet.
