I remember from as early as 4th Grade looking at the front page in the local Ogden, Utah newspaper and seeing the red stoplight in the upper-right corner indicating a red burn day. At that age, I had a hard time understanding what red burn days were for and was puzzled to see some of my friends with asthma issues stay in at recess on such days. At eight years old, kids usually have a hard time drawing the connection between having a fire burning in their fireplace and their friend's health. It wasn't many years later, however, that I realized that when inversion settled in over the Wasatch Front, even I developed a wheezy cough even though I thankfully haven't had any asthma issues and if I paid attention to others around me, I would hear the same chronic cough.
Unfortunately, it seems like many Utahans, and often Mormons in the US generally, have either not made or have refused to make the connection between the exhaust being cranked out by the hundreds of thousands of cars milling around Salt Lake City and the surrounding communities and kids' breathing and coughing. Many communities in Northern Utah get ranked consistently as having some of the poorest air quality in the country, ranking up with cities with enormous industrial activities where people expect to see smoke stacks spewing toxic pollution. Most people probably don't think about Logan or Salt Lake City or Bountiful, Utah when thinking of pollution-ridden communities, but yet these Utah communities rank beside cities like Pittsburg. And it's not just driving cars that leads to this extreme air pollution situation. The State's air pollution standards for industrial activities encourage high emitting companies to pass along the externalities of air pollution to the public to pay for and deal with.
But air pollution isn't the only issue where many LDS folks seem to show a surprisingly small regard for sustainable land management. It has been largely LDS members of the Utah legislature that have been pushing for years for State and National Parks to be privatized so as to allow oil exploration, mining, and private land ownership, which could lead to some of the most treasured parts of the State be closed to the general public. I hear from my US Forest Service colleagues stationed on districts around Utah that their recent work geared around restoring habitat and protecting streams and fish populations have been strongly opposed by most local residents, being much more in favor of the old forest management techniques of clear cutting and channelization of rivers.
The LDS faith, as an organization, strives to be as politically neutral as it can be, believing that its members should make their own decisions in matters of politics. However, it is enlightening to see the consistent opinion that Church leaders have voiced in terms of stewardship for the Earth.
“The earth is very good in and of itself, and has abided a celestial law, consequently we should not despise it, nor desire to leave it, but rather desire and strive to obey the same law that the earth abides,” said President Brigham Young, the LDS Church's 2nd Prophet in modern times.
More modern leaders of the LDS faith have been even more clear in God's expectations for wise stewardship of the natural resources available to us.
“We ought to take care of Mother Earth. She groans under the weight of our actions,” said Elder Vaugh J. Featherstone of the Quorum of the Seventy.
Elder Marcus B. Nash, a member of the 1st Quorum of the Seventy further describes our role as stewards of the Earth. “Behold, the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, and that which cometh of the earth, is ordained for the use of man for food and for raiment, and that he might have in abundance.”[20] Nevertheless, LDS doctrine is clear: all humankind are stewards over this earth and its bounty—not owners—and will be accountable to God for what we do with regard to His creation" (http://www.mormonnewsroom.org/article/elder-nash-stegner-symposium).
Elder Nash's explanation of what our relationship to the Earth's resources really is based on--stewardship not ownership--is the crux of the issue. Stewardship implies taking care of something owned by someone else. The scriptures are very clear about who really owns the Earth. "The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof . . ."(Psalms 24:1).
I'm not going to go into further arguments about this except to encourage everyone to read Elder Nash's talk at the 18th Annual Stegner Center Symposium quoted above. He outlines the argument much better than I ever could. And really, the purpose of this blog is not to convince people that a liberal view is the correct view to have, but rather, to explain that being Mormon and having a left leaning view on things is totally acceptable. When it comes to how we should be taking care of the Earth, conservation of natural resources is not just something that the Democratic Party adopted into its platform in the 1960's when it became popular to be concerned about saving whales. LDS theology from the beginning has espoused the idea of us being held accountable for how we take care of the Earth.
For me, my faith and political views often run hand in hand. I've been a strong advocate for environmental activism and natural resource management from a very early age, starting out speaking at city council meetings against building huge parking lots in the foothills for fear of flooding to meeting with US Congress members advocating for climate change legislative measures. Feeling the way I do about the Earth--that it is God's creation and a gift for us with expectations for wise management--has motivated my liberal view on the environment. I can't see how allowing mining practices that not only denude huge swaths of former forest and leach out deadly chemicals can be seen as wise stewardship, nor can I see how it could please God in anyway to see His creations be exploited in anyway.
I know that many well-meaning folks get turned off of modern environmental management practices when they see the extreme view being shouted in the public arena that nature should matter more than human life. For most people, the lives of their children are more of a priority than a frog in the Amazon. But when it comes to local environments, which concerns everybody because everyone is a part of some local environment, environmental concerns can be very impactful on the very children who parents consider top priorities.
I was getting a check up in a Dentist's office when my dental hygienist starting talking about two of her children. She expressed her great concern about the air quality's impact on her children. I told her I was interested in working for a government agency that addresses those concerns and she pulled the tool she was using on my teeth out of my mouth and looked at me with startling intensity. She said, "When you get into those agencies, you fix this for my kids." She said this with eyes close to tears. Beyond it being somewhat awkward consoling anyone with half of my mouth numb and the other half having apparatuses protruding out of my mouth, I promised her I would do my best. I've never forgotten that experience and it has motivated me to stick with the sometimes maddening protocols of the federal government. That dental hygienist, I'd imagine, is a staunch Republican. She probably nods her head when she hears Rush Limbaugh demonize the EPA's efforts to regulate air toxins. But this woman unknowingly bridged the concern of poor air and her kids health. That's why I keep going into work: because environmental health leads to human health. My religions back up this belief and even adds a commandment for us to take good care of the Earth. That's why I am happily a Mormon and Liberal.
