It is impossible to deny that Christians and Muslims have a common agenda here: both faiths have at their heart the living image of a community raised up by God's call to reveal to the world what God's purpose is for humanity.
Rowan WilliamsRead
Our present ecological crisis, the biggest single practical threat to our human existence in the middle to long term, has, religious people would say, a great deal to do with our failure to think of the world as existing in relation to the mystery of God, not just as a huge warehouse of stuff to be used for our convenience.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote highlights the ecological crisis as a serious threat to humanity, urging a perspective that sees the world as interconnected rather than merely a resource to exploit.
Rowan Williams emphasizes that the current ecological crisis poses a significant threat to human existence and stems from our failure to recognize the world's relationship to the divine mystery. He argues that many people fail to perceive the environment as a sacred trust, opting instead to view it solely as a vast storehouse of resources for human convenience, which leads to detrimental consequences for the planet.
Themes
Ecological CrisisHuman ExistenceRelationship To NatureSpiritualityEnvironmentalism
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a speech about climate change awareness to stress a deeper spiritual connection to nature.
More from Rowan Williams
All quotes βAs the gospels present it to us, the mission of Jesus of Nazareth is about the way in which the community of God's people - historically, the Jewish people who had first received the law and the covenant - is being re-created in relation to Jesus himself.
Rowan WilliamsRead
Keeping our eyes on journey's end is what we need - the place where we see at last the world that is greater than the world, the new creation that cannot be contained in present thought or social order or piety.
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Incidentally, one of the most worrying problems in the impact of Western modernity on traditional culture is that it quite rapidly communicates its own indifference or anxiety or even hostility about age and ageing.
Rowan WilliamsRead
Institutions develop because people put a lot of trust in them, they meet real needs, they represent important aspirations, whether it's monasteries, media, or banks, people begin by trusting these institutions, and gradually the suspicion develops that actually they're working for themselves, not for the community.
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A flourishing, morally credible media is a vital component in the maintenance of genuinely public talk, argument about common good.
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