Christian Stewardship
For a devoted Christian, stewardship of life should include
everything in life, in all of the many opportunities provided by God,
who gives us time, abilities, knowledge, money,
and relationships,
plus the earth's environment and natural resources, and more.
Christian Stewardship of Life as a Worldview
We see important ideas, spanning a wide range of life
experiences, in
Staying
on the Road Less Traveled: Fulfilling a Vocation by Keith
Miller & Ruth Miller, who
"see
stewardship as... a worldview that encompasses all of life... including what
we feel (e.g., arts,
aesthetics, relationships, worship), what we think (e.g., philosophy,
theology, history, science), and what we do (e.g., technology, work, finances,
social action, spiritual disciplines)."
These ideas are outlined with more detail — in sections
for Stewardship as a Worldview, Stewardship of Human Knowledge, Environmental
Stewardship, Ethics of Technology,
Social Responsibility, and Art for the Glory of God — by Keith,
who (along with Ruth)
"views
stewardship as a comprehensive concept including all aspects of practical
living and
the life of the mind," in an overview of
Stewardship
as a Christian Worldview.
Christian Stewardship as a Whole-Person Way of Life: This
is
a
website
for whole-person education, and a whole person lives in a way that effectively
integrates
all
aspects
of life. How? Cal DeWitt explains the mutual interactions
between scientia (How
does the world work?), ethics (What ought to be?), and praxis (Then
what must we do?) in The Professor and the Pupil: Addressing Secularization
and Disciplinary Fragmentation in Academia. (brief
summary plus full article)
The homepage about WORLDVIEW
EDUCATION FOR CHRISTIAN LIVING ends
by stating that "fully
living a Christian worldview involves a CHRISTIAN
STEWARDSHIP of everything in life, including our opportunities (which
depend on time, abilities, knowledge, money, relationships,...) and
our environment." Various aspects of "fully
living a Christian worldview" are explored below, for a
stewardship of our OPPORTUNITIES and ENVIRONMENT.
This website is being developed by the American
Scientific Affiliation (ASA); its
main feature is LINK-PAGES, such
as the one you're now reading, that combine introductory
overviews with
links to content-pages — some
from ASA members, but most written by others — where
you can explore ideas in more depth.
• Christian Stewardship of our OPPORTUNITIES
God gives each of us unique opportunities, which
occur
during time, in situations. An essential
part of "life stewardship" is making wise decisions about how to
most effectively use our opportunities. A
links-page about
CHRISTIAN
STEWARDSHIP OF OPPORTUNITIES looks at various aspects of life:
TIME —
"do not squander
time, for it's the stuff life is made of," said Ben Franklin.
ABILITIES — Each of us has unique abilities
(physical, mental, emotional, relational) given to us by God. We
can understand our abilities more fully by developing a personal awareness
(by noticing
what we're skilled at doing and what we enjoy doing) combined with contemplative
reflection (and prayer in which we ask God for guidance) that leads to self-knowledge.
KNOWLEDGE can be internal (with improved
self-understanding) or external (when we improve our understanding of the world); members
of ASA believe
that the world was designed and created by God, and that
scholarship (in
all fields that seek to understand the world, including science & technology)
can
be
a
religious
vocation, and that there are
many ministry opportunities for
CHRISTIANS
IN SCIENCE & TECHNOLOGY. {note: Jews and Christians, due
to our shared foundation of Judeo-Christian scriptures and beliefs, have many
similarities in our worldviews, but ASA is a Christian organization, and this
part
of
the
website
will
focus
on
Christian
stewardship. }
MONEY — financial resources can be useful in
achieving practical goals, and economic factors often play an important
role in our decisions about what to do and how, in our efforts to be better
stewards; currently,
wise
use of money is the most common focus of
Christian stewardship, although
(as emphasized in this page) God wants us to define stewardship
more
broadly,
to include everything in life.
RELATIONSHIPS — according
to Jesus,
the
second-greatest commandment is to
"love your
neighbor as you love yourself." One way to love people is
by evangelism, locally or globally, when we
"go
and make disciples of all nations." Another way is to love
people by serving them, by helping them meet their practical needs, as in
serving
the poor by using science and technology. The solid foundation
for Christian stewardship of life is
the
greatest commandment — to
"love the Lord
your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind" — because
this is our most important relationship. {
the
two great commandments}
Care of Creation: The creation of God includes people (as
in "relationships" above) and our environment (the focus
below).
• Christian Stewardship of our ENVIRONMENT
Now and in the future, what can Christians do to
improve the quality of our environment, to decrease pollution (and other
human impacts that diminish our quality of life) and help the earth be more
capable of sustaining natural ecosystems & human social systems,
to meet the energy demands of our modern lifestyles, and minimize the
harmful effects of climate changes?
Christian Environmental Stewardship — Christian
Ideas & Actions
• A links-page will help you learn about ideas-and-actions for
ENVIRONMENTAL
STEWARDSHIP that is based on a Christian worldview, that will help us more
effectively care for a world created by God. This links-page describes
educational and pragmatic actions by Christians, including members of ASA
who are trying to
be
good stewards through
actions in our
lives,
talks in our meetings (about
Serving
the Poor by using Science & Technology plus
other stewardship topics),
pages in our websites, and
papers in our journal:
In
Preparing
the Way for Action (1994), Cal DeWitt describes
Stumbling Blocks [for
Christians] to Creation's Care and Keeping: "While
convicted by environmental degradation and scriptural teachings on environmental
stewardship, we may find ourselves hesitating to do what must be done. Stumbling
blocks and pitfalls often prevent Christians from engaging in stewardly care
and reconciliation of creation. Once identified and recognized, these
things need no longer stand in our way, and we can proceed to act on our knowledge
and beliefs about creation and the environment." And more
recently, two interviews with Cal DeWitt in 2006 — by
Buzzsaw
Haircut and
Gristmill — and
a talk (
mp3).
In
Cultural
Transformation and Conservation (2006),
Fred Van Dyke describes
Growth, Influence, and Challenges for the Judeo-Christian
Stewardship Environmental Ethic: "In a period
of less than thirty years, the Judeo-Christian tradition was transformed
from being perceived
by scientific
and popular
culture as the
cause of the ecologic crisis to being viewed as a major contributor to its
solution. The increasing
attention and respect given to the Judeo-Christian environmental stewardship
ethic is in
large part a result of careful scholarship and effective activism in environmental
ethics and
conservation by the Christian community."
Christian Environmental Stewardship — Reducing
Pollution & Improving Quality
• a links-page about
CHRISTIAN
PERSPECTIVES on REDUCING
POLLUTION in our air, water, and land, plus other types of pollution (thermal,
radioactive) and things (like sound in our ears, chemicals in our food, loss
of natural beauty, loss of species & ecosystems) that decrease our quality
of
life.
• At the annual meeting of ASA in 2000,
"The
second plenary speaker...was Susan Drake Emmerich, a Christian anthropologist
who became involved in Tangier Island, a closed island subculture...in the Chesapeake
Bay with a population of about eight hundred
people. Susan spoke of the way in which she was able to become accepted
by the Tangier fishing community. The watermen would indiscriminately pollute
the bay with trash and oil. Susan convinced them to enter into a covenant
to preserve the bay by changing their waste disposal habits. She did this
by appealing to their already-established beliefs, connecting in their minds
their faith in Jesus (their Pilot on the water) with their caring for his creation." (from
the ASA Newsletter) You
can learn more about this fascinating
story
in
her own words [oops, link is broken, but I'll try to find it again] and
from
NOAA
Coastal Services.
Christian Environmental Stewardship — Energy Conservation
& Resources
• a links-page about
ENERGY
CONSERVATION & ALTERNATIVE ENERGY SOURCES has overview-summaries about
energy conservation (it's a powerful tool in policy decisions about
energy, at the levels of individuals & governments) and
non-renewable
energy (fossil
fuels: oil/gasoline, coal, natural gas) and
renewable
energy (solar, wind, biofuel, hydroelectric, geothermal, tidal, and nuclear
fusion) plus
other alternative energies (hydrogen, nuclear fission).
• Energy is a concern for many members of ASA,
and the theme of ASA's annual meeting in 2005 was
Alternative
Energy Resources & Energy Conservation. And in our 2003 meeting,
the presidential address of Kennell
Touryan emphasized the need for productive
action to
cope with a variety
of problems, including
energy
balance in a future with increasing demand and decreasing supplies.
Christian Environmental Stewardship — Global
Warming & Climate Change
• a links-page about
GLOBAL
WARMING & CLIMATE CHANGE — CHRISTIAN VIEWS explains the
basics (greenhouse
effect and gases causing it) and
effects (actual and potential,
affecting overall climate and also local weather patterns & weather
events in different parts of the world) and
controversies (how
fast is the earth warming? how much
of this is caused by humans? what are the present and future effects?)
and economic/political considerations, related phenomena (global dimming,...),
and more.
• ASA does not take an official position on this issue, but I think most
of our members agree with the
prepared
remarks of Randy Isaac (Executive Director of ASA) at the
NAE
press conference.
• What is the issue? For a quick introduction to a Christian perspective
on climate change,
The
Evangelical Climate Initiative has a small
website that's easy to explore, with a statement (Climate Change: An
Evangelical Call to Action), FAQ, Resources
(with Fact Sheets, a presentation by Sir John Houghton,…), and
an Invitation to Take Action (things you can do).
• And here is the context for the remarks by Randy Isaac: In January
2007, the National
Association of Evangelicals (NAE) issued a
press
release and
statement about
global warming.
• In July 2006, before this bold move, Tamara Hardison
criticized
the NAE for its "do
nothing" policy, and in the evangelical community there is still some
opposition to a "do
something" approach, as you can see in reports
by
CNN &
Washington
Post about the NAE meeting in March 2007.
Comments about this "Christian Stewardship Worldview" website:
I.O.U.s
Later, all
of the sections above will be connected by an introduction describing
the general
principle
that because we love God, we should be loving and serving what God has
created, including
people and the environment we share; Christian stewardship is the
outworking of this responsibility.
Later, each
links-page will offer links to pages on several levels — with
introductory stories (like those you might see in a newspaper), overviews
(to provide condensed summaries of important ideas, as in Cliffs
Notes), and explorations (for increased depth and breadth) — for
a variety of topics.
PLANS FOR ACTION: Soon (hopefully by mid-2014) there will be more content in the areas above: Ideas
& Actions, Pollution, Energy, and Climate Change) and then we'll make pages with additional information about ideas & actions by members of ASA.
A REQUEST FOR HELP
In order to find high-quality pages
at each level for many topics, I (the editor of ASA's website for Whole-Person
Education) will need help, and hopefully much of the creative work — in
deciding what to do and how, and then finding and selecting high-quality resources — can
be done by those who are more expert than myself, who know more about each
topic-area, and also know "who
is doing what" and who has written good pages about it.
When searching for content-pages, the key is SELECTIVITY. With
a search engine and a few minutes, it's easy to find lots of pages. It's
much more difficult to find the best pages (at all levels,
from introductory to in-depth) but this is the goal. We want to recommend
only high-quality pages, so users can learn quickly and well, and they won't
be overwhelmed with too many choices. {more
about
selectivity} {if you have helpful ideas, please contact me, Craig
Rusbult, craig@asa3.org}
You can see a preliminary
structure of topics by looking at the link-pages above, for OPPORTUNITIES,
ACTIONS, POLLUTION, ENERGY, and CLIMATE. But this structure is tentative,
and it will be modified during the process
of developing the website. If you
want to see parts of the overall website that are more fully developed,
check
Thinking Skills or
(on a larger scale) Creation
Questions.
