Ed Said - Somewhere over the rainbow

I am the first to admit that I am completely baffled and bamboozled by the climate change movement. There are two very distinct sides – those who believe in climate change and those who don’t – and both present a compelling argument with a diabolical array of theories and scientific data. Is it any wonder people are confused about what to believe?

However, something is happening, and whatever name you want to give it, one thing we should all agree on is that we are hurting the world in which we live, and at an increasingly alarming rate, as we strip the earth of its natural riches, pollute the very air we breathe, and fill our seas with islands of plastic and garbage. Mankind, it seems, is determined to flush itself right down the toilet.

But could it be that global warming isn’t about what we are doing to the planet, but rather what we are doing to ourselves and each other? Keep reading.

Those who believe in the prophetic will know that for thousands of years predictions of cataclysmic weather events, famine, disease and war have all come to pass, and if mankind has anything to do with it, there’s more to come.

The story of the Great Flood told in Genesis is perhaps the world’s first encounter with the apocalyptic effects of nature on the earth and those that live on it. When Noah looked up and saw storm clouds brewing, it was no surprise. He knew it was coming. God told him to prepare and be ready, and he was, spending decades building the ark. When the rain started, while others raced to get their dry washing off the line, Noah and his family took to the safety of their vessel, animals in tow, and battened down the hatches before enduring 40 days and 40 nights of torrential rain. The earth flooded and the rest of mankind perished.

This isn’t a story about man’s effect on the environment, but rather one of redemption and mercy. Removal of a wicked and sinful population was the only way a grieving God could save mankind from itself.

Fast forward about 4000 years, where naturalist David Attenborough calls his recent documentary ‘A Life on Our Planet’ his “witness statement and vision for the future”. After more than 60 years charting the ecology of the planet, in the film Attenborough uses what he has learned over the decades as both wonder and warning, that we risk dire consequences unless we restore the delicate balance of nature, and it has to be sooner rather than later. Imagine the environmental and ecological change he has seen over the decades. Those insights are what has him saying ‘Our planet is headed for disaster, we need to learn to work with it rather than against it’.

The theme is the same: It’s not about saving the planet, it’s about saving ourselves. Global warming and our decaying world are not a consequence of our relationship with our planet, but rather the consequence of the relationship we have with each other. The Great Commandment says we should love God, and love our neighbour as ourselves. But in this we are failing. History tells us man’s inhumanity to man will be the death of us, and this world, one way or the other, if we don’t heed the warning signs and get our shit together. Noah’s rainbow was a sign and covenant that the earth will never again be destroyed by flood. So what then lies over the rainbow? What fate awaits us?

The message may be confronting, and the consequences catastrophic, but often real human change doesn’t come until the situation is dire, almost hopeless.

Discussion and action around climate change always seems to be on such a huge scale that in a strange way we can almost insulate ourselves from our obligations to the planet by pretending that the sheer size of our oceans, forests and polar ice caps, or distance from them, means we simply can’t identify with climate change issues, and that surely we can’t make a difference. But in fact there is much that can be done right on our own doorstep. Maybe start by praying and getting to know your neighbour.