Earth Day 2013 AKA Radicals on Parade

I don't know if Earth Day has an “official” site, but Kathleen Rogers on this official-looking site billed Earth Day as “the largest secular event in the world.” I'd have to think about that one for a while. I don't know about the world but it's certainly not the largest, secular event in the US. I'm sure it ranks well behind Halloween, Independence Day, and probably even Cinco de Mayo. Still, it does get enough support that I could take a few moments to laugh at... er... I mean, write about it.

In the infancy of Earth Day, back in the 70s, the focus was on “over population.” It was feared that the earth did not have enough resources to support the three billion or so people who lived in the world back then so an early objective of Earth Day was to push for zero population growth. The idea of having children was booed by environmental advocates. Paul Erlich, author of The Population Bomb and an early champion of Earth Day made these radical statements:

“[T]he first task is population control at home. How do we go about it? Many of my colleagues feel that some sort of compulsory birth regulation would be necessary to achieve such control. One plan often mentioned involves the addition of temporary sterilants to water supplies or staple food. Doses of the antidote would be carefully rationed by the government to produce the desired population size.” [The Population Bomb, pp. 130-131]

Of course, abortion was also one of the big issues of the 70s and liberals used population control as another reason to support their argument to allow abortion. Liberals often defend their radical agendas by saying, “it's for the children.” In the case of abortion, that doesn't quite have the same effect so they instead said, “it's for the planet.”

We now have doubled the population of the planet since Mr. Erlich wrote his book so all of his dire predictions have been proven false. God commanded Adam and Eve to be fruitful and fill the earth (Genesis 1:28) so He gave us a world capable of supporting many times the number of people who are alive now. The idea of purposefully limiting population growth is not only unnecessary, it's also a direct rebellion to God's plan.

Liberals also hate the free market and capitalism and so, over the years, they have used environmental concerns as a cudgel to beat down private property rights and for-profit endeavors. At first, radicals simply did things like chaining themselves to trees to prevent logging. I wonder if any of these nuts lived in houses built with lumber? Anyway, it's gotten worse over the years and now we are forced to save the environment or face criminal fines. We can't drill for oil in Alaska because there are caribou there. California farmers couldn't water their orchards due to the delta smelt. I can't buy a five gallon flush toilet or incandescent light bulbs because legislators believe these things are destroying the planet. Now the EPA even wants to fine (fleece?) cities and states for the rainwater that runs off of roads and highways.

Liberals have even used the environment to meddle in healthcare. For example, the Feds have banned over the counter inhalers used to treat asthma and have forced asthma suffers to buy more expensive, prescription-only inhalers. The reason: the over the counter inhalers contained CFCs.

On this Earth Day, the focus is “climate change.” It's simply a new spin on the old theme of forcing everyone to comply with liberal ideology by making everything seem to be about the environment. Liberals want to control everything that everyone does. Even something like eating meat is condemned because cow flatulence is supposedly destroying the ozone layer.

And I can't resist mentioning the evolutionary connection to Earth Day. A few years back, I posted this Oakland Zoo quote about their Earth Day celebration:

Bring the whole family out to the Oakland Zoo from 10:00am - 3:00pm for Earth Day 2009 Festivities! This year, the theme is "We're All Connected." All of the world is connected in a beautiful web of life, including you!

You see, Earth Day advocates want everyone to believe we're all connected via evolution: people, pandas, and petunias – we're all the same.

Finally, Kathleen Rogers includes this quote in her article:

More than one billion people from almost every single country on earth will take an action in service to our planet.

What probably bothers me about Earth Day more than the liberal agenda on parade is the not-so-subtle idea of earth worship that seems to be going on. What exactly does Ms. Rogers mean when she says talks about acting “in service to our planet”? The Bible says that God gave us every green thing to be our food (Genesis 1:29). God gave man dominion over the birds and the fish and the beasts of the earth (Genesis 1:26). In other words, the earth was made to serve us; we were not made to serve the earth!

God gave us a wonderful world because He loves us. On this earth day, let's be good stewards over what God has given us but let's not glorify the earth. Instead, give glory to God for His providence!

Have a Christ-centered Earth Day!