This is not something good to think about at night. It leads to nightmares and really bad novel ideas. But if anyone ever starts to seriously consider this as an actual policy, that would keep lots of people up at night.
It's the double speak that bothers me. After stating that God created all things, the writers go on to state a belief:
Cornwall Declaration
2. Many people believe that "nature knows best," or that the earth—untouched by human hands—is the ideal. Such romanticism leads some to deify nature or oppose human dominion over creation. Our position, informed by revelation and confirmed by reason and experience, views human stewardship that unlocks the potential in creation for all the earth's inhabitants as good. Humanity alone of all the created order is capable of developing other resources and can thus enrich creation, so it can properly be said that the human person is the most valuable resource on earth. Human life, therefore, must be cherished and allowed to flourish. The alternative—denying the possibility of beneficial human management of the earth—removes all rationale for environmental stewardship.
So, am I reading that although God created nature, He doesn't control it anymore? I understand it is corrupted by our sin in the Fall and it groans for the redemption (somewhere in 1Corinthians, I believe) but this outright says that the earth without human intervention as the ultimate and that we know better than the creator. That to believe that God knew what He was doing when He created the earth and all that is in it is romanticism?? I pray we would all become incurable romantics, then. I find this a bit arrogant.
Human persons are moral agents for whom freedom is an essential condition of responsible action. Sound environmental stewardship must attend both to the demands of human well being and to a divine call for human beings to exercise caring dominion over the earth. It affirms that human well being and the integrity of creation are not only compatible but also dynamically interdependent realities.
Well, yeah, we are moral agents. And there is definitely independence, at least on our part, on the earth. I know we couldn't survive without our planet. The question is, would our planet survive without us?? This declaration seems to say, no.
Now the aspirations... these are um, interesting.
4. We aspire to a world in which liberty as a condition of moral action is preferred over government-initiated management of the environment as a means to common goals.
5. We aspire to a world in which the relationships between stewardship and private property are fully appreciated, allowing people's natural incentive to care for their own property to reduce the need for collective ownership and control of resources and enterprises, and in which collective action, when deemed necessary, takes place at the most local level possible.
So, what I am reading here, is that people, as moral agents, need freedom to do the right thing and don't need any government initiative. At least when it comes to the environment. As in, we know what is right and wrong and can be trusted to do the right thing. So why is that the case in the environment and not in social issues??? We know abortion is wrong, why can't we trust people not to have them? Why do the anti-abortionists need laws? We know that murder is wrong, why do we need government initiative there? It's wrong for corporations to not pay their workers overtime, why do we need a law about that?
It's the double standard that bothers me. If this group really believes that corporations can be trusted to do the right thing by the environment without government initiated structure, they are sorely wrong. They are willing to trust the natural incentive to stand strong on some forms of sin, but not all.
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