{"id":16249,"date":"2012-04-18T16:12:53","date_gmt":"2012-04-18T20:12:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/?p=16249"},"modified":"2012-04-18T16:12:53","modified_gmt":"2012-04-18T20:12:53","slug":"anglicans-embracing-insects","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/anglicans-embracing-insects\/","title":{"rendered":"Anglicans embracing insects"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>According to the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.anglicanjournal.com\/nc\/other\/news-items\/article\/earth-stewardship-means-having-regard-for-insects-too-10678.html\" target=\"_blank\">Anglican Journal<\/a>, we haven\u2019t been doing enough to look after the insect population \u2013 or, as I expect it will soon be called, the Insect Community.<\/p>\n<p>Since there 900,000 varieties of insect representing 80 percent of the world&#8217;s species and around 10,000,000,000,000,000,000 individual insects currently roaming the planet, it seems to me that they are managing quite well without our help.<\/p>\n<p>In fact, there are<em> too many <\/em>insects by far; insectophobia be damned, it&#8217;s time stock up on Raid and indulge in a little insect cleansing.<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The Anglican Communion\u2019s fifth mark of mission urges us to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth and all its forms. This is an issue that greatly concerns Dr. Stephen Scharper, an associate professor in the University of Toronto\u2019s Centre for the Environment, department of the study of religion and department of anthropology.<\/p>\n<p>In his promotion of planetary stewardship, the Connecticut-born expert in ecological theology often goes back to U.S. marine biologist Rachel Carson and her landmark 1962 book, <em>Silent Spring.<\/em> \u201cThis was a turning point in the environmental movement,\u201d he says. Carson challenged the modern world\u2019s domineering approach to nature and humankind\u2019s need to control everything in it, especially insects, with increasingly potent chemicals.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018This was a question of worldview as much as a question of science and data,\u201d says Scharper. \u201cWhat Carson helped people see was that this world view was at odds with the growing ecological understanding of integration and webs of relationships&#8230;\u201d In other words, we must respect even with the creepers and crawlers of the earth.<\/p>\n<p>[\u2026]<\/p>\n<p>Scharper, however, sees Carson\u2019s wakeup call as an invitation to the Christian imagination and community to embrace this worldview of integration with creation and a refusal to adopt a view of control and capitalistic exploitation. \u201cThe invitation is to reflect on a larger Christian worldview that embraces creation in a radical relationship,\u201d he says.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>According to the Anglican Journal, we haven\u2019t been doing enough to look after the insect population \u2013 or, as I expect it will soon be called, the Insect Community. Since there 900,000 varieties of insect representing 80 percent of the &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/anglicans-embracing-insects\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"iawp_total_views":3,"footnotes":""},"categories":[126],"tags":[893],"class_list":["post-16249","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-eco-cobblers","tag-insects"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16249","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16249"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16249\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16249"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16249"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.anglicansamizdat.net\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16249"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}