Environmental ‘crisis’ can unite religions, rabbi says

BANGOR – The degradation of the environment is a “universal human crisis” that affects rich and poor, Democrat and Republican, Christian, Jew and Muslim – and cooperation across these national and cultural boundaries may be the only way to meet such an overwhelming challenge, according to Rabbi Lawrence Troster, a world-renowned scholar of the relationship between religion and science.

“Climate [change] is not going to affect only a few people, it’s going to affect everyone, everywhere,” Troster said during a regular meeting of the Bangor Foreign Policy Forum on Monday morning.

All three of the “Abrahamic” faiths, as well as Buddhism, speak of a duty to care for the divine creation. And increasingly, clergy from across the religious world are connecting their responsibility to an environmental movement that is – perhaps unfairly – perceived as secular and political.

“Creation is the common source of all our spiritual traditions,” Troster said.

Deep divides among faiths, denominations and even individual congregations remain; but in the face of “crisis,” the religious community has been able to unite over climate change, he said.

“Environmentalism is a philosophy that transcends all prior political, religious and cultural categories,” Troster said.

Among several teaching appointments, Troster serves on the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life, or COEJL, – one of many groups that make up the National Religious Partnership for the Environment. In this ecumenical world, Troster has worked alongside the evangelical Christians who led the “What would Jesus Drive?” campaign and met an organic farmer, who offered Orthodox Jews the opportunity to understand the ancient agricultural tenets of Jewish law.

Many national and global religious leaders have endorsed the link between faith and environmentalism, last year signing an open letter urging the world’s political leaders to take action on climate change. Local churches, synagogues and mosques are coming to the table more slowly, but groups such as the Maine Council of Churches, Maine Interfaith Power and Light, and their counterparts elsewhere have made a start.

“None of the traditional religions have ever had to face something like this before. Think about the magnitude of what’s happening,” Troster said.

Each congregation uses its own language and finds its own priorities, but the stewardship message is the same. In a time of environmental crisis, world religious leaders are finding common ground, he said.

“Human beings alone have the ability to upset God’s work,” Troster said.

“We can no longer escape [our] responsibility for the decline of the basic life systems of the world,” he said.

But Troster’s message Monday was anything but dire. The example set by the faith communities’ environmental movement provides hope for cross-cultural cooperation in other universal areas, like addressing poverty and violence.

“Environmentalism can draw upon some of the best ethical values of all the world’s religions,” he said.

Troster spoke as part of the Bangor Foreign Policy Forum. The next presentation in the forum is scheduled for 7:30 a.m. Monday, Aug. 1, at Montes Catering on Columbia Street. Michele Wucker, senior fellow at the World Policy Institute, will speak about immigration and U.S. foreign policy. For more information, contact the Department of International Affairs at the University of Maine at 581-1519.