As a kid
growing up in Ohio, I went to church every Sunday. Many times the lessons
revolved around how humans, mankind, was given dominion over all. This was
drilled into many a Christian head and I think that it has come back to bite
us. Heresy, you say…I think not…because no where does God say we have a right
to end any of the species on the earth. Too many have taken that version to the
point we’re going to end up killing ourselves.
Yes, God
gives us his word in Genesis 1:26 that states: “And God said, Let us make man
in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of
the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the
earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.” Do any of
you read somewhere in there that we’re allowed to cause the death of anything
we have dominion over? Didn’t think so.
This is one
of the big reasons I stopped going to church. Notice I said church because I
didn’t disbelieve in God but I started to not believe in the religious order of
any faction. Why you may ask…my God wouldn’t want me to think I’m above the law…especially
his law. One of the ten commandments says though shall not kill. In my opinion,
it should have said though shall not kill or be killed any person or the
creatures that I gave you dominion over all.
Personally,
I chose to think that God is rather displeased with the way we are running
things. See, we’re killing the planet and frankly, most of the world’s
population don’t care. Will you care when we’ve killed the last elephant?
Destroyed the last coral reef? Or breathe our last breath of fresh air? Drink
our last drop of fresh water?
I’m sure you’re
wondering where all this came from and where it’s leading too. Today, I watched
a documentary. It was called Chasing
Coral (www.chasingcoral.com) and
somewhere in the middle, I found myself crying like a baby because of the truth
on the screen. A picture can say a thousand words and when you see great
portions of the worlds corals dying because of the change in ocean temperature,
it’s a sobering thing. A thing that makes me cry because everything is so
connected.
And for
those naysayers, it’s happening world wide, not just the Great Barrier Reef or
in the Carribean or Hawaii but everywhere. EVERYWHERE
one of the man producers of oxygen is dying. What? You didn’t know that these
reefs produce the very air you breath. It’s done so since the beginning of
time, since the moment they came into existence. No matter you believe that is
the truth.
Healthy Reef |
Dying Reef via Bleaching Event in Thailand |
I don’t care who you listen to but the facts are this: rainforests only produce 28% of the air you breath and 70% is produced by marine plants. That only leaves a mere 2% coming from other sources like all the other plants in the world and chemical reactions. No oceans, no people.
We were
given guardianship over this earth and we’re screwing it up, people. Frankly, I
wanted to use harsher language but I’m hoping that you’ll share this with
everyone you can. We need to realize we are killing our own future if we don’t
take this climate change bull by the horns and bend it to our will. We MUST change otherwise we will kill our
own species along with everything else that is beautiful and wonderful about
this place we call home.
The current
administration is bad for us because of this one point. They only care for the
here and now while we really need to be caring for the future and then. Our
kids and grandkids will have a horrible, horrible world if we don’t do what we
can when we can. If we don’t fix it NOW,
we may never have another chance. In the movie Chasing Coral, it was noted that
the world experts estimate we only have about 25 years before the coral is
dead. Since coral is the rainforest of the ocean, it’s imperative we slow down
global change as much as we can today.
Someone said, it takes a village…now…we all know who that someone
was and the fact is that she was correct. These conclusions weren’t done just
by people in the most educated areas of the world but worldwide. Volunteers
from 30 countries gave information to help make this film.
Watch it and draw your own conclusions. We, the human race,
have dominion over it all. Are we strong enough to save it?