The Rev. Lee Hudson is preaching at the State House this week, urging legislators to protect God's creation from global warming pollution.
Hudson is lobbying on behalf of 210 Lutheran congregations in Maryland as he tries to persuade the General Assembly to pass a bill to require a 25 percent cut in greenhouse gases statewide by 2020. Other religious leaders - including those of the Presbyterian Church in Central Maryland, the state's Episcopal Diocese, the Unitarian Church, and several ministers and rabbis acting individually - also have come out in support of the Global Warming Solutions Act.
"All of the things that we say in the Genesis story, that God made creation and it was good. ... We think the environment, including the climate, is part of that gift," said Hudson, pastor of the Messiah Lutheran Church in Baltimore's Canton neighborhood. "We will reach a tipping point where the building up of these gases will change the climate, and that's a threat to life and to that created good."
A key vote could come today on the bill, which is supported by environmental and public health groups but fiercely opposed by industries and some unions, which say it could drive jobs out of the state. The Maryland Senate cast a preliminary vote, 28-18, in favor of the legislation yesterday.
The activism of some clergy in the state's political fight over global warming legislation is part of a national trend toward more environmental action by religious organizations. Leaders of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Jewish Council for Public Affairs, the National Association of Evangelicals and the National Council of Churches, which represents about 100,000 Christian parishes across the country, sent a letter to U.S. Senate leaders in December encouraging action on global warming.
"Major faith groups across a broad denominational and ideological spectrum have reached a religious and moral consensus on the need for effective action to curb global climate change," said the letter to Sen. Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat and chairwoman of the Environment and Public Works Committee.
But it is not a unanimous view that the Bible endorses government regulation of carbon dioxide. Some religious people question whether more harm could come to the poor from pollution regulations, which could drive up the price of electricity, than from the flooding and crop damage associated with global warming.
