News, writing projects, etc

I've let this blog lag a little - been a little busy, so here's come updates.

I Googled myself last night - it's always interesting to see your digital footprint (and potentially sobering so always be mindful before you put anything online). I discovered that my Red Letter Christians post, A Theology of Farts and Orgasms, which examines the connection between diet, reproduction, the image of God and the rest of creation, was quoted heavily in a blogpost on Eden Keeper. A blog I'll have to keep my eye on.

I also have a blog piece coming out tomorrow that looks at eschatology and its link to creation care entitled Beam me up Goddy. See Red Letter Christians for that. Yes, yes, I need to post more here too!

I then discovered that Australian comedian, and I'm guessing now social commentator, Wendy Harmer, quoted what I'm guessing was my guest bog post on the ABC's Environment blog in a January edition of the Sydney Morning Herald, looking at the environmental theology of the Pope (the one in the Vatican, not me). See here for that piece.

On other news, my book A Climate of Hope, Dawson and Pope with Urban Neighbours of Hope is well underway. It's with proofreaders and we are slowly getting in recommendations for the back cover.

I will be writing a book on ecomissiology. Length, etc still to be determined, but it will be based on my Tinsley Institute lecture on missiology from 2013, which is available on the web in various places as well as a chapter in Speaking of Mission: Volume 2.

Finally, a new ecojournal has been started by the Anglican Diocese in Perth, and I'm hoping my paper on A Theology of Wilderness will be published. Busy times.

Keep writing, thinking and acting in our mission to care for God's Earth.

I don't want the future to be a museum - climate extinctions

Today I took my family to the museum here in Melbourne to see the Aztec exhibition. Reflections on that are for another time and another of my blogs. But for here I want to reflect upon what I saw in the impressive room where they have their taxidermied animals.

I really wanted to yell out lines from Psalm 104 "Lord, how many are Your works! In wisdom You have made them all;the earth is full of Your possessions."

What I did do was raise my hands in the air. And then I walked over to the stuffed polar bear and apologised. Odd I know, but it seemed like a good idea at the time. In Ice, ice baby I looked at Arctic sea ice loss. We know this is having an impact on polar bear hunting. They may yet disappear in the wild.

And then it struck me, museums are awesome places of learning, where species past and present are on display. I'd just walked briefly through the dinosaur section. I don't want the museum to be the only place (zoos notwithstanding) where you can go and see the species on display. Sea level rise, ocean acidification, loss of habitat, rising temperatures shrinking cloud forests, declining rainfall, and so on. So many species could disappear in a warming world. If we can say with the Psalmist "Let the glory of the Lord endure forever; Let the Lord be glad in His works", then we can only assume he'll be just a little point out if we add more to the list of creatures God can no longer be glad in, to say nothing of ourselves and the many related issues.

Museums are a great place to visit, but I don't want to live in one.