"Caring for God's Creation", June 2, 2024 — Santa Teresa Hills Presbyterian Church

“Caring for God’s Creation”

Genesis 1:26-31 and 2:1-3

Pastor Deb Troester, STHPC, June 2, 2024

As most of you know, I just returned from a two-week trip to Peru. It’s hard to describe just how beautiful a country Peru is, from the Pacific seashore in Lima to the grassy-green mountains and fertile plateaus of the highlands, up to rugged snow-capped mountain peaks, and the mist-covered pinnacles of the cloud-forests surrounding Machu Picchu. Each time I thought I had seen the most spectacular view, we would round a corner, and would see something even more stunning. I actually got tired of taking scenic photos – I took so many of them!

I went with six other people from the San José Presbytery. We wanted to meet our PCUSA mission co-worker, Jed Koball, and see some of the work he and our partner churches and organizations in Peru are doing, specifically in the area of protecting the environment and the health of people affected by air and water pollution. These issues are sometimes referred to as environmental justice, because they affect the poorest people far more than their wealthier neighbors, who can afford to move away from the sources of pollution to cleaner neighborhoods.

One thing we learned was that the indigenous people of Peru lived in harmony with nature. To avoid depleting the soil, they planted corn, beans, and squash together and they had a seven-year rotation of different crops. For example, after planting potatoes, they let the ground rest for a year before planting something else. The ancient Incas were skilled engineers who terraced the mountainsides with stone retaining walls to hold in the scarce rain water. They were sophisticated in their use of irrigation. They even developed a process for freeze-drying potatoes to preserve food without using any chemicals. By the way, I learned that there are some 3000 kinds of potatoes grown in Peru! As in many parts of Africa, the chief apportioned the land to be used for agriculture. Land was considered a common good, and anyone willing to work could grow food for their family. The ancient Incas focused on maintaining harmony with all of life, rather than exploiting nature for the benefit of a select few individuals. This way of life contrasts with our modern view of the earth as an object, there for the taking, regardless of the effects on the balance of nature, or if the people living there might be harmed by so-called “progress.”

One of the places we visited was La Oroya, in the mountains of central Peru. La Oroya is known as one of the world’s most polluted places. In 1922, a U.S. mining company built a metal smelting plant there which produced toxic fumes and acidic dust containing heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, arsenic, copper, and zinc. The pollution has contaminated the soil and water supply, and has seriously affected the health of the local population. In one study, 99% of the children there were found to have over three times the World Health Organization’s recommended limit of lead in their bloodstreams. In 2009, the smelting plant closed due to environmental regulations and debts, and the health of the local population improved. However, the smelter has recently re-opened, and you can once again smell the pollution in the air.

Just this March, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights condemned the Peruvian government for neglecting to regulate the La Oroya mining complex, ordering the country to compensate for environmental damage and provide free medical care to victims.

Our mission co-worker, Pastor Jed, reminded us that the people of La Oroya would still need to be vigilant to ensure that the court’s ruling was followed. “There is still work to do,” he said.

Of course, this is nothing new. When the Spanish first arrived in the Americas, it was with the object of finding and exploiting the riches of these newly discovered lands. As King Ferdinand commanded, “Get gold, humanely if possible, but at all costs, get gold.” Where did this Christian monarch get the idea that his subjects could invade a foreign country, enslave its occupants, steal its treasures, and exploit its resources, without regard to the well-being of the local people? In 1493, Pope Alexander VI issued a decree called “The Doctrine of Discovery” which proclaimed that any lands occupied by non-Christians were free for the taking, and that the inhabitants should be converted to Christianity, by force, if necessary, or enslaved. As late as the 1800’s, the U.S. Supreme Court used this doctrine to justify the taking of Native American lands.

In 2016 the Presbyterian Church repudiated this doctrine. The Catholic church just repudiated it last year, apologized for historical atrocities committed under its authority and reaffirmed respect for the dignity of all peoples and the value of indigenous cultures.

One of the scriptures often cited as justification for exploiting natural resources, no matter the consequences, is the one we read this morning: Genesis 1:28. God says to Adam and Eve, “Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it and have dominion over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the air and over every living thing that moves upon the earth.” The word “dominion” is from the Hebrew “radah,” which is translated “to rule over, to reign, or to subjugate.” Yet to understand this verse we need to look at the wider context of scripture. Does the Bible condone unrelenting, harsh, or cruel exploitation of animals and plants? Does it condone actions, such as mining or other industries that poison the air and water, harming human beings and nature alike?

Exodus 23.12 states, “Six days you shall do your work, but on the seventh day you shall rest so that your ox and your donkey may have relief…” Deuteronomy 22.4 says, “You shall not see your neighbor’s donkey or ox fallen on the road and ignore it; you shall help to lift it up.” And Deuteronomy 25.4: “You shall not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain.” So, while it is OK to sacrifice or eat certain animals in the Old Testament, God obviously cares about them – that they not be treated cruelly, or overworked. What did Jesus teach? “Consider the lilies of the field,” “Consider the ravens: they neither sow nor reap, they have neither storehouse nor barn, and yet God feeds them.” “Are not five sparrows sold for two pennies? Yet not one of them is forgotten in God’s sight.” Jesus taught that God cared even for small animals and plants. If we are children of our heavenly Father, shouldn’t we care for them, too?

Presbyterians have a word for this: stewardship – not the kind where we give money to sustain the work of the church, although that is important – but the idea that all creation belongs to God,

and we are responsible to care for it. That idea is expressed in Psalm 24: “The earth is the Lord’s and all that is in it, the world, and those who live in it…” We are to be stewards, or caretakers, of God’s creation.

During our journey together in Peru, we had many opportunities for talking about our faith and how it relates to our lives. One of my companions asked the question, “What is God like? What characteristics or qualities does God have?” Of course, we all answered, “God is loving, God is kind, God is forgiving. God is like a good parent, wanting what is best for all of us and for all of creation.” Would a God like this want us to lay waste to our planet, wantonly polluting air, water, and soil, without regard for our neighbors who live there, without regard for plants and animals who make their home there? In Genesis, God gives humanity “dominion over” plants, animals, our planet – but what kind of dominion? Was God commanding us to be selfish, greedy, exploitative despots, or rather kind and benevolent caretakers of that which God has entrusted to us?

Despite the heartbreak of seeing all the environmental damage done in La Oroya – mountainsides denuded of vegetation and covered with toxic dust, people suffering from cancer, lead poisoning, and respiratory diseases, our visit there was still my favorite day of the entire trip. Why? We climbed a mountainside – one that was still green, with lots of trees planted on it – 30,000 to be exact - 30,000 native Peruvian trees, each planted lovingly by hand and cared for over the past 25 years, by a group of women known as the Asociacion Filomena Tomaira Pacsi, after a young woman who died after giving birth during a march to the capital city of Lima. A group of women from La Oroya were there to demand their right to live in an environment that was safe for their children to grow up in, without dangerous pollution. They didn’t want the mines and smelter to close, but were only asking that environmental safeguards be put into place.

Part-way up the mountain, we stopped at a small plaza with stone benches and a statue of an Andean woman holding the hand of her child.

Soon a group of school children arrived – then more and more, until there were some 50 or 60 middle-schoolers and high-schoolers gathered with us, all wearing brightly colored red, blue, or green school uniforms. They were members of environmental clubs organized at local schools by the Asociacion Filomena. One by one, each group presented a skit or song teaching about the importance of preserving the environment, complete with large posters of trees giving off oxygen and factories and cars billowing black smoke. One large poster read (in Spanish): “If trees gave us Wi-Fi, everyone would be planting them like crazy. It’s too bad that they only produce oxygen, which we all need to breathe.” After the presentations, we watched a demonstration on how to plant a tree. The kids were coming back next month to plant some 700 trees, which they would care for during the dry season by watering them regularly, until they get established. They we embarked on a hike up the mountain to see the view of the town and surrounding mountains. On the way I became dizzy, due to the altitude, and sat down to rest. One of the grandmothers who had come along with the kids sat with me until I felt better and gave me an orange to eat. Her name was Dominica.

She had been coming to plant and water trees on that hill for 25 years. She had brought her daughter with her, who was now one of the women teaching the children. Now she and her daughter were passing on their wisdom and entrusting the trees to the next generation.

That day with the kids, among the trees planted by their parents and grandparents, gave me hope – hope for the future, hope for a better world, hope for a time when we might all fulfill God’s command to care for the earth, and for each other, with justice, and kindness, where all can share God’s bounty, where no one has too much, but all have enough. May God teach us all to truly be care-takers of Creation. Amen.