The Environment

Abstract

Environmental matters have only recently come to the forefront of public awareness. The mass media nowadays are always reporting environmental problems. Political parties vie with one another in claiming to be ‘greener than green’, while the Green Party itself has gained many supporters not because of its policies (few people know what they are) but simply because it is primarily concerned with the environment. Even the Prime Minister herself has pointed to current dangers in our environment. There has been no rush to change our national way of life, or to alter personal lifestyles, or to take practical steps to improve the situation, so that individually and as a country we could become more ‘environmentally friendly’. Yet there is an undercurrent of genuine anxiety. The object of this chapter is to show that environmental concern not only involves practical changes to prevent harm being done to the planet, but it also raises ethical problems of great importance, and that these ethical problems are difficult to solve without some religious input. Purely humanistic ethics seem insufficient.