WASHINGTON, Apr 20 (LifeSiteNews.com) – “Modern environmentalism too often travels down a dangerous path of extremism,” warned a broad-based coalition of Jewish, Catholic and Protestant clergy, scholars and people of faith, speaking at a press conference in Washington Monday. They announced the formation of the Interfaith Council for Environmental Stewardship and marked the release of the “Cornwall Declaration on Environmental Stewardship (ICES),” an important new document that has been endorsed by some of America’s most influential religious leaders.
Some prominent signers of the declaration include Dr. William Bright (Campus Crusade for Christ International), Dr. James Dobson (Focus on the Family), Rabbi Daniel Lapin (Toward Tradition), Joseph A. Morris (Midwest Region of B’nai B’rith), and Father Richard John Neuhaus (Institute on Religion and Public Life).
Both the coalition and the declaration support traditional Judeo-Christian principles of environmental stewardship, based on faith and reason, sound science and concern for humanity. The Interfaith Council for Environmental Stewardship is concerned that traditional religious teachings have been brushed aside by major environmental groups and their ideological allies in certain liberal religious organizations. “Even the desperate plight of the world’s poorest citizens is frequently given only lip service, as environmentalists elevate concern for nature above concern for people,” says ICES.
The group discussed the cataclysmic global warming theories noting that the alarmist position contradicts the views of over 17,000 scientists, who have signed the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine’s petition, which states that there is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of greenhouse gases is disrupting the earth’s climate. Moreover, ICES notes that the UN’s Kyoto Protocol requires that the United States reduce its carbon dioxide emissions to 7 percent below 1990 levels. To achieve this goal, Americans would have to slash their use of fossil fuels by almost 40 percent below current levels. “Once again, minorities and the poor will be asked to bear the burden of ill-conceived social policy,” observed one of the speakers.
See the ICES web site.
See the Cornwall Declaration.