Stewardship and Instrumentality

After a lot of ranting and joking on the subject of climate change and recycling and the environment generally and thoughts about favourite words, it occured to me that a small, serious word on it was necessary to bring my mind back into check.

The earth was created as a home for us and we were given stewardship over it. Stewardship is a pretty old-fashioned word these days but I like it. It has a serious tone about it, a real sense of responsibility. Something has been entrusted to us and we have both the duty and the ability to look after it. A bit like our own bodies and our kids. We are instruments intimately involved in the welfare of the planet. And we can choose to be instrumentally positive or instrumentally negative. However small an instrument (apparently size doesn't matter...?!?)

There really is no argument about each of us doing our bit. It doesn't really matter whether everyone else is doing theirs or not. It shouldn't change our attitude whether China builds a new power station this week or not. George Bush (or we could even wait for Barack Obama/Hillary Clinton) signing up to emissions reduction targets would be a great thing. Our government and oppositions getting together to agree policy to reduce emissions is laudable. But whether they happen or not, none of it changes our own, individual duty, responsibility and ability to do our bit and to try and persuade others to do theirs.

So I for one will continue to recycle - including paper because I'm not convinced that the entire life-cycle does prove that it's better not to bother. I will continue to drive a diesel car because I think that the increased fuel economy outweighs the other more harmful elements in it versus petrol. I will think very seriously about where I fly and how often. I will even seriously consider carbon offset programs - even if they don't completely offset, planting more trees has still got to be a good idea, hasn't it? I will continue to be annoyed by excess packaging. I will continue to try to get a local organic veggie-box delivered (the village is too small and they won't come to us unless we sign some others up). I'll continue to use home delivery for my shopping rather than individually drive a 20 mile round trip to do it. I'm still pleased the mooselets were in cloth nappies.

And I will buy a motorbike because it's even more fuel efficient (even a BMW...) And I will fight to get Mooselet #2 into the same fantastic school as his brother because then we'll drive less miles on the school run.
Ooops, those last two slipped in there...
Maybe they aren't quite so altruistic - even though they are true.

The truth is what we all do matters in so many ways. More, we matter to other people, we matter to the earth and the environment and most importantly we matter to God. Every single one of us out of all 6.6 billion people matters.

Our choices determine not only the state of the planet for our kids to inherit but also the well-being of our hearts and souls. Practising appropriate stewardship and recognising our responsibility and instrumentality are good things in themselves and I'm all for them, even if they don't save the planet.