“The
emergence of a civilization in which knowledge moves freely and almost instantaneously
throughout the world… has spurred a renewed investigation of the wisdom
distilled by all faiths. This panreligious perspective may prove especially
important where our global civilization’s responsibility for the earth is
concerned. Native American religions, for instance, offer a rich tapestry
of ideas about our relationship to the earth.”[1]
Al Gore, Earth in the Balance
"We
should... help in the development of a global consciousness... to
change the world for the better."[2]
Mikhail
Gorbachev, founder of Green Cross International
"We commit ourselves
to... a civil society which respects environmental and social justice."
UNESCO's Declaration
on the Role of Religion in a Culture of Peace
| Resources to aid your Understanding |
| |
On
Earth Day, April 22, 1990, I sat near the altar in a mainline church watching
a strange ceremony. At one point, the members of the youth group stepped forward
to present their offerings:
“I bring to our
Mother, the Earth, the gift of a new beginning…”
“I bring to our
Mother , the Earth, the birth of a new consciousness.”
“I
bring to our Mother, the Earth, the gift of immortality that you may live
forever cherished by your beloved children.”
The
congregation responded to this pagan ritual with a standing ovation.
Earlier
in the program, a young woman minister had danced her interpretation of the
Creation story. Throughout the graceful performance, a voice narrated the
creative acts of a female deity. At one
point, “she” gave birth to earthly life -- here the dancer crouched on
stage and "birthed" an inflated globe.
Nature worship in the church?
A Mother Goddess in Place of God our Father?
Could this be happening in a supposedly conservative
Presbyterian
church?
Grieved, I thought about the
spreading delusion prophesied in the Bible, when lawlessness would soar and
people would reject sound doctrine and follow teachers who tickle their ears (2 Timothy
4:3-4). Might this be such a time?
The
National
Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE)
would say no. This umbrella organization for various religious groups, including
World Vision and other members of the Evangelical
Environmental Network, would most likely approve such nature worship.
Its mission statement calls for more of the same spiritual blend:
"We
seek to weave the mission of care for God’s creation across all areas of
organized religion, and to do so in such a way as to contribute scope of vision,
moral perspective, breadth of constituency, and endurance of struggle for all
efforts to protect the natural world and human well-being within it." (emphasis added)
ONENESS IN
THE MILLENNIAL
CHURCH
The
National Religious Partnership shares the basic principles outlined in
UNESCO's Declaration
on the Role of Religion in a Culture of Peace. Funded by globalist
leaders such as Ted Turner, it joins Al Gore and Gorbachev in a worldwide
effort to implement a global management system that would control
the world's natural and human resources according to socialist principles.
Keep
in mind, God calls us to enjoy and care for His creation as He would. As steward
of His magnificent creation, we need to follow His guidelines which rule out
waste and abuse. But to Gorbachev and others, environmental regulations serve
as a practical means to manipulate behavior and mold beliefs that fit UN standards
for collective
thinking and exclude Biblical Christianity. At the "end of the cold war,"
the futuristic minds of The
Club of Rome summarized the strategy:
"In
searching for a new enemy to unite us, we came up with the idea that
pollution, the threat of global warming, water shortages, famine and the like
would fit the bill...."[3]
In
this context, it makes sense to celebrate Earth
Day on Lenin’s birthday. After all, the green movement was born
through a merger of radical environmentalists, feminists, Marxists, and peaceniks
in the sixties. Many saw Buddhism, Native American spirituality and witchcraft
as inspiring models for their green agenda. In
a classroom video titled Spaceship Earth: Our Global Environment, Rock
singer Sting summarized their reasoning:
"The
Indians believe that the spirits live in the trees, that the spirits live in the
river, that the spirit is in the air. I think we used to believe that in the
past... and... if there's a spirit in a tree, you don't just chop it down and
burn it."
It
also seems strangely fitting that Easter and Earth Day share the same busy
weekend in this millennial year. Many "evangelical
environmentalists" have already redefined the gospel, implying that Jesus
died on the cross to redeem the planet, trees and wolves as well as people. They
encourage their followers to
confess sins against the earth, not disobedience against God, and they
conform the significance of the cross to fit the new multicultural consciousness
of our changing culture.
In
other words, the
"old
rugged cross, so despised by the world" doesn't fit. A
cross that not only joins believers to Christ, but also severs His followers from the
rest of the world would offend the global community. Such "separatism"
clashes with the envisioned solidarity.
In
fact, many would find the yin-yang
a far more fitting symbol for today's spirited quest for planetary consensus
and sustainable
communities. Around the world, opposites are
merging and old absolutes are recycled. Young and old envision peace
on earth, unity in diversity, social equality, and a global bio-family sharing
resources equally on a finite planet. They demand that the Church walk hand
in hand with their brave new world into the sunrise of the new millennium.
It’s
an alluring vision to people trained to dream, imagine, flow with the crowd, and
reject all contrary facts. But it’s not reality. Human nature hasn’t
changed. And God has not revoked His Old Testament warnings concerning climate,
rain, and a healthy planet. He still tells us that sin, especially spiritual compromise, reaps drought,
famine and war, not peace and prosperity.
PAGANISM
BLENDS WITH EASTER
But
liberal church leaders ignore such offensive truths. Seeking a more popular
image, a United Methodist Church in our neighborhood advertised an “Interfaith
Holiday Fair” on Palm Sunday a few years ago. Troubled, I stopped by to see the show. The throbbing drum beat of
the multicultural band greeted me in the crowded parking lot. A table at the
entrance displayed various books promoting the United Nations, peace
education, and earth-centered religions. Beyond this propaganda for world unity, stretched a large hall
with tables dedicated to the world's religious traditions.
Judging
by the crowd around its table, the Baha’i display seemed most popular. I
recognized some of its books and earth-centered literature from UN and global
conferences I had attended. The leader’s missionary zeal drew surrounding
spectators into enthusiastic dialogues that emphasized the unity, relevance and
earth-saving power of the Baha’i faith.
The
Buddhist table offered more children’s stories on peace-making and conflict
resolution. I scanned some of them: Learning
the Skills of Peacemaking, a classroom book on “communicating,
cooperating, and resolving conflict,” had repackaged the pantheistic view of
spiritual unity into a popular lesson on global activism for elementary age
children. How the Children Stopped the
Wars amplified the same message: Adults had created wars and conflict. Now
it was up to the children to envision peace. Buddhism would prepare the way.
Towering
over the Hindu display stood a large poster inviting interest in the Hindu
mantra “OM Sweet OM.” Below it, stacks of books invited browsers. Titles such as The Journey of a Master, Swami Chinmayanda, In the Footsteps of Ghandi,
and the Bhagavad Gita, left little
doubt what world view they taught.
“Hinduism
is not a religion,” explained a woman wearing the traditional Indian sari.
“It is a way of life.”
ANCIENT
SYMBOLS FOR A CROSS-LESS EASTER
I found the “Christian” display a distance away from the center of activity. Near it, a group of children sat in a circle
threading yarn around two sticks forming a cross. Each was making an “Eye of
God”—a popular craft representing the eye of the Egyptian god Horus. Two other children were petting a living Easter bunny crouching in
a cardboard box. The table itself was decorated with Easter eggs, and among them
I saw five children's books. But titles like And
God Created Squash and Did Jesus Wear
Blue Jeans seemed as trivial and unholy as the colored eggs that surrounded
them.
I
looked in vain for a Bible, and found only a picture book that mentioned the resurrection. The
Easter Story did show that Jesus was crucified and rose from the grave. But
the real purpose of His death—to deal with sin—was ignored. It ended with this
incomplete, and therefore misleading, message, “This
is why Christians celebrate Easter. We remember that Jesus gave us His life
because He loved us.”
I
picked up another picture book, An Easter
Celebration: Traditional customs from Around the World,
and began to read:
“Long before Jesus walked on the earth, people celebrated when spring
arrived. In ancient times, people thought the times of the season were guided by
spirits or gods and goddess.” Apparently, the author wanted to show the
children that “the ancient Celts, Persians, and Greeks” preceded God's hand
in history and should be considered more credible than the Bible.
Two
years later, Al Gore, who calls himself a Baptist, wrote a similar
message in Earth in the Balance. Notice how he chastises Christians for their uncompromising faith and
blames them for the demise of goddess worship:
“The
richness and diversity of our religious tradition throughout history is a
spiritual resource long ignored by people of faith, who are often afraid to
open their minds to teachings first
offered outside their own system of belief.
“The
spiritual sense of our place in nature . . . can
be traced to the origins
of human civilization.
A growing number of anthropologists and archeo-mythologists...
argue that the prevailing ideology of belief in prehistoric Europe and much
of the world was based on the worship of a single earth
goddess, who was assumed to be the fount of all life and who radiated
harmony among all living things....
[Ceremonial sites] seem to confirm the notion that a goddess religion
was ubiquitous throughout much of the world until
the antecedents of today's religions---most of which still have a distinctly
masculine orientation--swept out of India and the Near East, almost
obliterating belief in the goddess. The
last vestige of organized goddess worship was eliminated by Christianity....
[I]t seems obvious that a better understanding of a religious heritage preceding
our own by so many
thousands of years could offer us new insights...."[4]
(Emphasis added)
Al
Gore was wrong. No "religious heritage" preceded God's sovereign reign
over the affairs of man. He gave people the freedom to rebel and worship
other gods but didn't stop judging their sin or withholding rain when their
faith turned from their Maker to idols.
Throughout
history, spiritual compromise has been a constant temptation, and our Easter
traditions show the timeless trend toward unholy alliances. While the constant
pressure of persecution kept the early Church pure in faith, the shift to
cultural acceptance in the Roman empire brought compromise. Then as
now, the Christian's goal changed from pleasing God to pleasing man. Soon,
the
politically correct church had traded purity for popularity and adopted
the "abominable" practices of its pagan neighbors.[5]
Take a look at some of them:
Easter,
the name: According to the
Encyclopaedia Britannica, "the 8th century derived it from that of the
Anglo-Saxon spring goddess Eostre,"[6]
whose name, in
turn, might have come from "eastre," meaning spring. Once
again, pagans honor her as the "goddess of dawn," one of many
fertility goddesses celebrated during their spring equinox.
Easter
bunny and eggs: According to The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols
& Sacred Objects, "The Goddess' totem, the Moon-hare, would lay eggs
for good children to eat. ... Eostre's hare was the shape that Celts imaged
on the surface of the full moon, derived from old Indo-European sources."[7]
While the historical record is too sparse
to provide factual details, the Pagan
Home Website offers the following description:
"Eostre, a Germanic Goddess, is associated
with both spring and sunrise. Tradition has it that Eostre, saved a bird
whose wings were frozen from the harsh winter by turning it into a magickal,
egg laying hare. Eostre was a maiden whose aspects of renewal and rebirth
brought about the reappearance of bright spring flowers, baby chickens fresh
from the shell, baby bunnies from their winter dens and the reoccurrence of
the plow in the field. In some European traditions flowers grew from her
footprints.
"Pagans lit new fires at dawn to cure ills,
renew life and protect the new crops. In some cultures this sacred day
included the ringing of bells, singing of songs, and decorating of hard
boiled eggs. Eggs were a symbol of both the sun god (the golden yolk) and
fertility (the white shell symbolizing the White Goddess) and were used both
as talismans and eaten in ritual. The eggs of wild birds were gathered and
these eggs are recreated today with the dyes used in Easter celebrations.
The weaving of Easter baskets harks back to the weaving of birds' nests, a
necessity prior to egg laying and the continuation of the life cycle."
Hot
Cross buns: Some link them to the goddess Eostre, and suggest
that the distinctive crossed lines on top represent "Wotan's cross," not the
cross of Christ.[8] Others
simply attribute the symbol to the Wiccan "quartered circle:" four equal lines
pointing from the center to the spirits of the north, east, south, and west
-- or to the basic element: earth, water, air (or wind), and fire. In Native
American traditions, it forms the basic pattern of the medicine wheel
and plays a vital part in major rituals. (see Circle in Symbols
and their meanings)
Countless
pagan sites add mythical details that bring life to the bare bones of history.
Their stories may tickle the imagination, but they will never bring the wisdom
and understanding needed to follow God in a world that has traded truth
for myth. The apostle Paul's letter seems as relevant today as ever:
"For the time will come when they will not endure sound
doctrine, but according to their own desires, because they have
itching ears, they will heap up for themselves teachers; and they will turn their
ears away from the truth, and be turned aside to fables. But you be watchful
in all things, endure afflictions...."
2 Timothy 4:2-5
SEEING
THE CREATOR
Watchfulness
comes by "beholding" God in His Word, then seeing everything else --
good and evil, beauty and corruption -- through His eyes. That's only possible
when we have recognized our need for His redemption,
have trusted in the victory of His cross over sin and death, have received His life, and
have given our lives over to Him. Then,
as we follow Him, He shows us the wonders of the exchanged life: His strong
and wonderful life for our weak and failing life. For God "made Him who knew no
sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of
God in Him." (2 Cor. 5:21) Looking at Him in the light of the
cross, we have the wisdom and strength to follow His way, care for His planet,
and love one another with His eternal love. "Blessed is the people whose
God is the Lord!"
When I survey the wondrous cross
On which the Prince of glory died,
My richest gain I count but loss,
And pour contempt on all my pride.
Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ my God!
All the vain things that charm me most,
I sacrifice them to His blood.
Were the whole realm of nature mine,
That were a present far too small:
Love so amazing, so divine,
Demands my soul, my life, my all.
See
also
The Cross: Feared, Banned, Trivialized... yet Triumphant
The Triumph of the Cross
| Do
you believe in Easter?
Earth Day Joins Easter - A Sign
of Our Times?
Facts about the Resurrection of Jesus Christ
Images
of the Cross in God's Creation
[1]Al
Gore, Earth in the Balance; Ecology and
the Human Spirit (Houghton Mifflin, 1992), pages 258-259.
[2]
Michail Gorbachev, Plenary speech at the 1996 State of the World Forum in San
Francisco.
[3]
Alexander King & Bertrand Schneider, The
First Global Revolution (New York: Pantheon Books, 1991), 115.
[4]
Gore, page, 258, 260.
[5]
Deuteronomy 18:9-12.
[6]
Encyclopedia Britannica, Vol. 7
(Chicago: William Benton, 1968),
page 865b.
[7]Barbara
G. Walker,
The Woman's Dictionary of Symbols & Sacred Objects (San Francisco:
Harper, 1998), 377.
[8]Ibid.,
page 64.
Provided by
Berit Kjos
See our selection
of wonderful
books by Berit Kjos
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