Caring for creation isn’t political. In fact, it’s our chance to build relationships and a sense of life that, critically, go deeper than politics.
The question is not whether we will hold convictions about public issues, or whether those convictions will put us at odds; we will, and they will. The question is whether we are building — and rebuilding — relationships robust enough to hold those differences, whether we are living in communities where our vision of the world can re-center the people we meet there.
Brendan McClenahan
Stated more firmly: Caring for creation is an antidote to polarization because our alienation from creation and creation-oriented communities is a critical part of what’s creating these political divides.
Connection with God through creation meets a human need for transcendence and providence. We are affirmed that we are part of a web of life sustained by God. Caring for creation can remind us we all are formed from the same dust and live on the same planet.
Through creation, God teaches us to steward abundance. God teaches us companionship, care, belonging, transcendence and provision. God invites us beyond the fear of scarcity or mistrust of others, and God so often uses creation to do so.
“God invites us beyond the fear of scarcity or mistrust of others, and God so often uses creation to do so.”
When we are alienated from our relationship to creation, we try to meet our need for transcendence and providence by looking to other things — including, very often, politics. Who will feed me? Who will sustain me? Who will justify me? Who will care for me? Whom should I fear?
It reminds me of the story in Genesis, when an ecological disaster drives Jacob’s family to Egypt for food. As the famine deepens, Egyptians pay their money, sell their livestock and finally surrender their land to Pharaoh in exchange for grain. A fragile ecology drives people into an untenable political conflict.
By the beginning of the book of Exodus, Pharaoh becomes fearful and enslaves people. But look at how God delivers people from this entanglement. God leads people out of Pharaoh’s political system and into the wilderness where they relearn how to receive from God, rest from work and live as a community of grace.
What would it look like for God to deliver us from our politically dependent relationships today? Might God use creation once more to teach us to trust each other? After all, polarization isn’t a symptom of too much difference. It’s a symptom of a lack of trust.
When we invite neighbors into creation care, we invite them into a community built first on shared responsibility and mutual care, not on ideological alignment or fixation on real or perceived scarcity. In the course of creation care practice, we meet our own needs at the same time we become able to perceive and meet the needs of those who live near us. Working together changes how we see one another, and ourselves.
Shared work in creation is a way we can exercise and bolster our most fundamental identity: Formed from dust, to be stewards of Eden. In this setting, we learn to rely on people who are different from us. And over time, this builds trust. And the church has the ability to build these settings. In fact, it has a responsibility to do so.
The church’s call is to be a reconciling community, a foretaste of new creation. Through the church, people can experience restoration with God, creation and neighbors. The church can and must be a place where people experience the kind of healing we need from our inflammatory, divisive politics.
So, if you find someone’s beliefs intolerable, pray for them. Bring them tomatoes and zucchinis from your garden. Join them for a hike. Over time, your heart will change — and theirs likely will too.
Brendan McClenahan is church engagement manager for Plant With Purpose and creator of the Tend initiative.