Mother Nature provides us with scenes of breathtaking beauty in forest or field, canyon or cave, lagoon or lake; reminding us of unimaginable power. Our news is full of accounts of extreme weather. We can picture the hot winds of drought driving choking columns of dust into the air, see photographs of the damage done by tornados, and watch videos of devastating floods.
Early in the summer of 2012, I spent a week at the University of Dayton at a Chautauqua Course learning about the work of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) taught by the physicist, Robert Brecha, who was one of the scientists contributing to the work of the IPCC. One half of the week dealt with sustainability and the other with climate change. The evidence that our carbon footprint is affecting the climate is overwhelming. On the last day of the course Dr. Brecha gave us a summary entitled Climate Change and Social Justice. It was a wake-up call. In the seven years since that experience, the evidence for climate change and human contribution to that change has increased, and still… there are good people who consider it a hoax. Is there miniscule possibility that it could be worth the risk? What changes can good stewardship call us to?