Environmentalism as Religion
In this article, Joel Garreau explores the idea that environmentalism has become the new religion of choice for urban atheists, overtaking the traditional place of socialism for them.
In a widely quoted 2003 speech, Crichton outlined the ways that environmentalism “remaps” Judeo-Christian beliefs:
“There’s an initial Eden, a paradise, a state of grace and unity with nature, there’s a fall from grace into a state of pollution as a result of eating from the tree of knowledge, and as a result of our actions there is a judgment day coming for us all. We are all energy sinners, doomed to die, unless we seek salvation, which is now called sustainability. Sustainability is salvation in the church of the environment. Just as organic food is its communion, that pesticide-free wafer that the right people with the right beliefs, imbibe.”
According to Garreau, environmentalism has: 1) merged with Eastern-based spiritualism and concepts lifted from Hinduism, Daoism, or Buddhism; 2) harked back to pagan and animist traditional (pre-scientific) beliefs; and 3) and started a “greening” process of Judeo-Christian theology.
Freeman Dyson, the brilliant and contrarian octogenarian physicist, agrees. In a 2008 essay in the New York Review of Books, he described environmentalism as “a worldwide secular religion” that has “replaced socialism as the leading secular religion.” This religion holds “that we are stewards of the earth, that despoiling the planet with waste products of our luxurious living is a sin, and that the path of righteousness is to live as frugally as possible.” The ethics of this new religion, he continued,
“are being taught to children in kindergartens, schools, and colleges all over the world…. And the ethics of environmentalism are fundamentally sound. Scientists and economists can agree with Buddhist monks and Christian activists that ruthless destruction of natural habitats is evil and careful preservation of birds and butterflies is good. The worldwide community of environmentalists — most of whom are not scientists — holds the moral high ground, and is guiding human societies toward a hopeful future. Environmentalism, as a religion of hope and respect for nature, is here to stay. This is a religion that we can all share, whether or not we believe that global warming is harmful.”
Both Dyson and Garreau make a case that there is nothing wrong with the modern ecology movement and environmentalism being partially based on faith and belief and, like religion, looking partially beyond science and empiricism. But both of them warn that environmentalism could become a guilt-based Carbon Calvinism or turn to irrationalism. As Branden Allenby has written about the language of the carbon fundamentalists:
“indicates a shift from [seeking to help] the public and policymakers understand a complex issue, to demonizing disagreement. The data-driven and exploratory processes of science are choked off by inculcation of belief systems that rely on archetypal and emotive strength…. The authority of science is relied on not for factual enlightenment but as ideological foundation for authoritarian policy.”