BallotVox

Earth Day Boycott

Earth Day altar [lars hammar / Flickr]

One youth pastor in central Pennsylvania probably isn’t impressed with Google’s Earth Day holiday logo today. He thinks Earth Day is the “worst holiday ever” because it turns the earth into an idol. In fact he’s staging a personal boycott (hat tip to Ann Raber):

God created the earth for us to enjoy but He also placed us as stewards of the earth. What do I think a steward of the earth is? It would be a person who takes care of what God has entrusted him with, does not do anything to purposefully destroy God’s creation or abuse it, but is also someone who enjoys the creation in a variety of ways. I like to see the things that God created, and I also like to use the resources that God created. I like to heat my home, I like to use my car, I like to turn on my lights, and most importantly…I love to eat creation. God opened up the buffet of His creation when Noah got off the ark. […]

The earth is not going to end until God’s time comes to end the earth. Do you think God is concerned about global warming (if it even exists?) or an energy crisis? God wants us to use wisely what He has given us but He also is the one who is under control. The liberals are trying to make us forget about God by telling us that we are the ones who are destroying the earth. Do we not forget that sin is the cause for the earth’s deterioration? The liberals want to place government in control of the way we should take care of the earth because they have no place for God. […] In my family I will make sure that we are stewards of what God has created but I will also make sure that our worship and service is to God and not to the earth. That is why I’m boycotting Earth Day.

John McCain also promotes a “stewardship” approach, but he uses the word as a call to action “on an issue we can no longer afford to ignore.” With neither McCain nor the Democratic candidates boycotting Earth Day, this pastor will, come November, have to cast a vote for someone worried about global warming — or else boycott the election.

Update, April 24th, 2008: Lars Hammar wins a creative-commons spirit award. He didn’t object to the way we used his Earth Day altar photo even though he wasn’t worshipping the earth. He explained, in a FlickrMail, that his church was simply “using it as a backdrop for the sacrament - more as evidence of the work of the creator.”