Church Appoints Theologian for Earth Stewardship

Estab­lish­ment of an “Earth Stew­ard­ship The­olo­gian” posi­tion at Mon­treat Pres­by­ter­ian Church (U.S.A.), in Mon­treat, North Car­olina, marks a new mile­stone in the congregation’s grow­ing Earth Min­istry pro­gram. In announc­ing this step, the church’s pas­tor, Rev. Mag­gie Lauterer, expressed her belief that the effort “is part of reclaim­ing who we are as ser­vants of the Cre­ator. Our mis­sion is to care for God’s peo­ple and God’s cre­ation. We are very for­tu­nate that Rev. Dr. Cam Murchi­son will help us ini­ti­ate this effort, as he brings a wealth of knowl­edge, a dis­tin­guished back­ground and great energy to our work con­cern­ing the environment.”

The Earth Stew­ard­ship The­olo­gian is expected to help nur­ture a Bib­li­cally sound basis for all of the congregation’s efforts deal­ing with envi­ron­men­tal sub­jects, so that the glory of God is always a focus. In this capac­ity, Murchi­son will aug­ment the effort of the lay mem­bers of the Earth Min­istry Team. In its first year, and as a pilot project, the work will develop a long-range frame­work for activ­i­ties that may include preach­ing ser­mons, lead­ing Bible stud­ies and orga­niz­ing mis­sion trips con­cerned with Chris­t­ian stew­ard­ship of Earth and its resources.

“What really excites me about this project is the spe­cific work of par­tic­u­lar con­gre­ga­tions as they shape con­crete responses to the urgent need for car­ing for God’s cre­ation,” said Murchi­son. “The rea­son that I want to be a part of the effort is to par­tic­i­pate in the trans­la­tion of bib­li­cal, the­o­log­i­cal con­vic­tions regard­ing care for cre­ation into the rou­tine real­i­ties of every­day: our food, our trans­porta­tion, our hous­ing, our com­mu­ni­ca­tion, our invest­ing, and our con­sum­ing. The chal­lenge is for us to devise faith­ful and resilient ways of liv­ing that respect the integrity and the lim­its of the home we have been given—the earth itself.”

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Mem­bers of the con­gre­ga­tion have a strong ded­i­ca­tion to the qual­ity and sus­tain­abil­ity of the envi­ron­ment, but some­times we are unsure of how to trans­late that aware­ness into mean­ing­ful actions that reflect our Chris­t­ian faith.
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Although the Earth the­olo­gian is begin­ning as an unpaid vol­un­teer who will be part-time, accord­ing to William Sea­man, who leads the church’s Earth Min­istry Team, the con­gre­ga­tion rec­og­nizes the value of hav­ing some­one with Murchison’s back­ground to help develop their “envi­ron­men­tal lit­er­acy.” “Mem­bers of the con­gre­ga­tion have a strong ded­i­ca­tion to the qual­ity and sus­tain­abil­ity of the envi­ron­ment,” Sea­man noted, “but some­times we are unsure of how to trans­late that aware­ness into mean­ing­ful actions that reflect our Chris­t­ian faith. Cam Murchi­son is just the per­son who can bring us from the Book of Gen­e­sis, to the the­ol­ogy of John Calvin, and into mod­ern top­ics as diverse as eco­log­i­cal jus­tice, fair trade, glob­al­iza­tion and the gospel of Jesus. To our knowl­edge, no such sim­i­lar posi­tion exists in the Pres­by­ter­ian Church, and our intent would be to care­fully explore its use­ful­ness to both our con­gre­ga­tion and also the greater church com­mu­nity and soci­ety as a whole.”

To launch the Earth the­olo­gian ini­tia­tive, Mon­treat Pres­by­ter­ian Church offered to the Swan­nanoa Val­ley com­mu­nity a pro­gram called “Clues for a World on the Edge.” The three-week study took “Cre­ation as the The­ater of God’s Glory” as its theme. Cam Murchi­son began the study in Jan­u­ary and con­cluded in Feb­ru­ary. The classes exam­ined selected Old and New Tes­ta­ment texts and the­o­log­i­cal per­spec­tives deal­ing with God’s rela­tion­ship to the whole cre­ation. The study explored impli­ca­tions for Earth care. The pro­gram was free and open to the pub­lic. All were welcome.

Per­haps, this local ini­tia­tive could be a model for churches all across the country.

Con­tact

William Sea­man
Mon­treat Pres­by­ter­ian Church (USA)
Box 577, Mon­treat, North Car­olina 28757
info@montreatchurch.org
(828) 664‑9212

Con­gre­ga­tions, Become Earth Stewards!

• Join Pres­by­te­ri­ans for Earth Care
• Become an Earth Care Congregation
• Young adults: become an Eco-Steward
• Down­load a study guide on bib­li­cal and the­o­log­i­cal foun­da­tions for eco-justice
• Read these church earth-care stories

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