THE BEAUTY OF CREATION AND THE RESPONSIBILITY OF MAN

TABLE OF CONTENT

1.0 INTRODUCTION

2.0 THE BEAUTY OF CREATION

2.1 THE RELATION OF GOD AND CREATION

3.0 THE RESPONSIBILITY OF MAN

3.1 WHAT IS AT STAKE IN A CASE OF IRRESPONSIBILITY OF MAN

4.0 CONCLUSION

1.0 INTRODUCTION

“…and God saw that all was good”. All was created good; the creator adorned his creation with so much beauty. Much more than that, the creator shared his essential goodness with his creation, even though it was not a necessity, creation is the creative initiative of the divine. The Christian affirmation of God’s creative freedom enables us to overcome the limitations of other points of view that, placing a necessity upon God, end up maintaining fatalism or determinism. There is nothing “in” God or “outside” of God that obliges him to create. Thus the catechism of the Catholic Church number 293 says “God created all things not to increase his glory, but to show it forth and to communicate it”.

The beauty of creation include its importance as being the foundation of God’s saving plans; the beginning of our history of salvation. This is a truth accessible to natural reason. We can easily relate to the beauty of creation. However, this beautiful creation was left to the physical care of man. In other words, Man is the crown of creation. Man therefore is given the responsibility to tend and care for creation. The responsibility of the first man is thus stated; ‘to make an inventory of all the animals and give to each a name’. If man remains reluctant and apathetic to confront the ongoing destruction of the environment, soon the beauty will be wounded. The Genesis narrator describes the creation of man in retrospect. This crown of all creation was placed in the beautiful Garden of Eden, whose main source of blessing was a four-branched river carrying fertility to all the earth, both inside and outside of Eden.

However, it is important to distinguish between creation as the creative action of God (active), and creation as the created reality that is the effect of God’s action (passive). This work refers to creation as the effect of God’s action. Creation in the active sense is the bringing forth to being of all things by God from nothing. This implies that God brought everything into existence when there was no prior existence. This creation by God out of nothing means that there is absolutely nothing in common to the preceding non-being and being that follows it. Creation in the passive sense refers to the created order which God looked upon and said they were all good. In this sense, creation refers to everything that was made.

2.0 THE BEAUTY OF CREATION

The only ultimate beauty is the Lord God Almighty himself. He caused goodness, truth, and beauty in the world by virtue of the act of creation. Because God is good, what God does is good and the result of what God does is good. Thus, creation is full of the afterglow of God's goodness, leaving people with a taste of what goodness really is.

In the active sense, the beauty of creation is seen in the radical coming into being of what was not there ‘before’. Even the ‘before’ here is an imagination because before creation there was no before, only God existed. According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church number 293, this beauty is also shown in the absence of succession in creation. God has no other reason for creating than his love and goodness: creatures came into existence when the key of love opened his hand. The creation saga is a poetic expression which proclaims the divine intention and love behind the act of creation. Creation is a divine work of art, a reflection of the glory of God. In the beginning God created the world beautifully. God created all things there are, blessed them and gave them purpose and meaning. Creation has integrity given to it by God. It is not a necessity since it adds nothing to the greatness of God. Creation rather shows forth the glory of God who is beauty in himself. Thus we see the hands of the intelligent designer in the beauty of His creation.

 God is the creator and sustainer of all there is. The universe whose beauty and unimaginable size we are only now beginning to discover. This same God who created the universe is present in every single detail of creation; knowing and holding dear every atom, every speck of dust on every star and planet, caring about every blade of grass and every single thing of creation. God’s spanning of one and many, huge and miniscule, this instant and always, here and everywhere, omnipotent and vulnerable is even further beyond human imagining. “God wanted man to know him somehow through his creatures, and since no creature could fittingly reflect the infinite perfection of the Creator, he multiplied his creatures and gave a certain goodness and perfection to each of them so that from them we could judge the goodness and perfection of the Creator, who embraces infinite perfection in the perfection of this one and utterly simple essence.”(Robert Bellarmine 1542-1621). The whole of creation exhibits goodness and beauty which comes from the goodness and beauty of the creator himself; the source of all goodness. The creator created according to his design and purpose, by the power and the authority of his word. Thus creation is characterized by order and harmony. While each creative reality has the divine goodness in it, yet the totality of it has the bearing of being “very good”: goodness intensified, indeed becoming perfect, whole and holy, when communion and spirit of oneness is dwelling among all things. The totality of God’s creation includes the intricate web and network of relationships of the created realities with their limits and possibilities.

2.1 THE RELATION OF GOD AND CREATION

If God stop relating to creation, creation will cease to exist because it is God that sustains creation. When we consider this relation in terms of the act of creation, God as the creator has no real relation to creation because it real relationship imply that the subject and the term are simultaneous and are simultaneously known. This would put God in some obligatory relation to creation. This will also imply that God would, in a certain way, be dependent on creation, which is impossible. God is not related to creation substantially because creation would then necessarily be eternal, which is not so. However, creation has a real relation to God because it’s a relation of origin. Creation therefore is dependent on God, like the real relation of an effect to its cause.

3.0 THE RESPONSIBILITY OF MAN

According to the catechism of the Catholic Church number 294, the glory of God is man fully alive. God’s special intention for creating the human being is made specific in the responsibility and task given to them “to have dominion” (rādâ) over and to “subdue” (kābash) especially all living beings. These are very strong terms, but in view of responsible stewardship for God’s creation under God’s authority, stewardship is an awesome task. In essence, stewardship means rendering service to God’s order and plan in creation. This stewardship is meant to responsively safeguard the divine intention of “ecology” in creation.  In this the human being has a double task: first of all, it must be responsible to its own “ecology”, namely to take proper care of the goodness of communion of body and the breath of God in it, so that it can be a worthy personality and agent for stewardship; and secondly, it must direct and guide the “ecology”, namely the heart-matter of all creation.

The entire world is God’s creation, and its continuing life and preservation are thoroughly dependent upon God. However man is giving an important role to play within creation. Humanity created in the image and likeness of God is blessed through grace to be a partner with the divine in the continuing work of creation. The question of responsibility of man is a question that bothers also on the purpose of man. In creation, God brings into existence human beings with the freedom to love both God and their fellow creatures. To be human is to know, love, and delight in God and to share in God’s life as far as created beings may. Thus it is in praising and worshipping God that we discover who we are as human beings. However, our rejection of God compromises the proper relationships we were meant to enjoy with God, each other, and creation so that we no longer live up to our high calling as God’s stewards.

Man is called to preserve the beauty of creation. Man as the crown of God’s creation, created in the image and likeness of God, is created to take an active role in the task of caring for and tending the creation of God. There is a stewardship mandate that goes along with the prominent position of man within creation. In other words, man is commissioned and he plays a stewardship role to creation. Every created good by God, was left temporary under the care and stewardship of man. Creation is in a constant journey toward perfection and man guides creation on this journey. Therefore, man is the steward of God’s continuing creation.  However, this God’s given role to man is not a license for misuse or abuse of creation. Man is told and instructed to subdue the earth and dominate it, however this doesn’t make man equal to the creator; it only makes him a higher creation. Thus man remains accountable to God his creator in whom he hope he would have his beatific and eternal rest. As a matter of fact, man’s responsibility for creation and his duty towards nature is an essential part of our faith as Christians. Reflection on the Christian faith will make us more alert and responsive to the call to care for created things. As in the book of Genesis, we are meant to rule over creation, to practice dominion. But what is the nature of this rule? We should inquire how the different cultures of humanity relate to nature. Cultures shape human minds and give us an insight into humanity’s readiness or not to accept changing its attitude in dealing with its natural environment and exercising its stewardship.

Gaudium et Spes number 12 says, the Scripture teaches that men and women were created in the image and likeness of God and are able to know and love their Creator who had set them over all earthly creatures that they might rule them and make use of them, while glorifying God. John Paul II in the Social Encyclical Centesimus Annus number 37 reminds us that humanity in its use and care of creation must be very much conscious of its duties and obligations, especially towards the future generations.  Thus man cannot make an arbitrary use of the earth and also cannot subject it without restraint to his will. This is because creation has its own requisites and a God-given purpose which should be developed by man and not violated. From the days of Adam, man have seen and delighted the beauty of creation as the creator made it.

Unfortunately, creation is distorted; the beauty of the beginning is not exactly what is today; resources are becoming exhausted, climate is changing, pollution devastates large cities, and oceans are drying. As a matter of ignorance, majority of us know little about the logic of creation and the interconnectedness of everything created. Consequently we can ignorantly do harm to creation without knowing the implications of what we do. For instance some desert areas of our planet developed as a result of man’s abuse of nature. In as much as technology is positive advancement in the history of man, it equally makes possible the inflicting of harm and damages on nature. However, fortunately, our growing technology has enabled us to understand better how to embellish our earth and how to avoid the harm that has been done to it in ignorance or greed. Therefore man needs to develop his awareness, discovering in his responsibility the call to contemplate and care for God’s created world. The responsibility placed on man in creation is a call to discover and delight in the beauty and awesomeness of creation bearing in mind that beauty is fragile and can be damaged. Man need to have a high ecological aptitude. To this effect, John Calvin (1509-1564) once said

“Let him who possesses a field, so partake of its yearly fruits, that he may not suffer the ground to be injured by his negligence; but let him endeavor to hand it down to posterity as he received it, or even better cultivated. Let him so feed on its fruits that he neither dissipates it by luxury, not permits it to be marred by neglect. Moreover,…let everyone regard himself as the steward of God in all things which he possesses. Then he will neither conduct himself dissolutely, nor corrupt by abuse those things which God requires to be preserved.”

The point of mankind’s stewardship for creation places us squarely in creation’s ecology today in the face of climate change and climate justice. In this great era of mankind’s Industrial and Technological Revolution it is important to recognize the steward’s role to render service to the Creator’s technology and industry in the Revolution of Creation, to safeguard them and discover hidden energies thereof. Man’s responsibility to the created order run through several generations of humanity.

3.1 WHAT IS AT STAKE IN A CASE OF IRRESPONSIBILITY OF MAN

Our common stewardship strengthens strong human values which are foundational. This sense of responsibility cuts across generations of humanity. Since their first days on our earth human beings have looked at the world and seen that it is good. They have delighted in its beauty. They have been grateful for the good things that provide them with shelter, food and clothing. And they have been led to some crucial questions: To what extent must the beauty we admire be left untouched, save to be nurtured and safeguarded? How much is to be used so that we might live well upon this earth? And how are our resources to be cared for and replenished so that our children, too, might be able to live upon the earth?

Economic imbalance between advanced industrial countries and less developed countries, the destruction of environmental capital resources are at stake in a case of irresponsibility on the part of man. Resources are becoming exhausted, climate is changing; pollution devastates large cities; oceans are drying; population is increasing; nations close themselves in search of identity; globalization progresses promising benefits yet arousing fears.

Ugliness pervades our culture. We see the hatred of cultures, the destruction of our world, the sadness that affects our society day after day. Sometimes all we can think is negative. Where does positive even enter our frame of mind? The truth is yes, our society is bad. However, let us not forget the good things that God has placed before us. Let us remember the Lord still reigns in ultimate authority. Let us not forget the beauty of God. He is beautiful. His work is beautiful.

“If God is really at the center of things and God’s good future is the most certain reality, then the truly realistic course of action is to buck the dominant consequentialist ethic of our age, which says that one should act only if one’s action will most likely bring about good consequences, and simply, because we are people who embody the virtue of hope, do the right thing…Our vocation is not contingent on results or the state of the planet. It is simply dependent on our character as God’s response-able human image-bearers.” 

4.0 CONCLUSION

The God who is Love unconditionally loves all of the creation and not merely us who are able to enter into a conscious relationship with Him.  We may express the divine image and likeness by loving the creation as God loves it, and by exercising stewardship and earth-keeping as an act of love. God loves creation and uses it as a pointer to Himself. He made us an inseparable part of creation but gave us a special role within it. We have abused our rule, and damaged God’s creation. But in his plan of salvation, he will redeem creation along with us, and restore us to our proper place within it. The only ultimate beauty is the Lord God Almighty himself. He caused goodness, truth, and beauty in the world by virtue of the act of creation. Because God is good, what God does is good and the result of what God does is good. Thus, creation is full of the afterglow of God’s goodness, leaving people with a taste of what goodness really is.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1.  Andrews University Seminary Studies, Spring-Summer 1994, Vol. 32.

2.  Maurice M. Makumba, Natural Theology: With African Annotations, Pauline publications, Nairobi, 2006.

3. The Catechism of the Catholic Church, Society of St Paul, Ibadan, 2015.

4. Rick Faw, A Brief Theology of Creation Care, www.goodseedsunday.com

5. Rev. Fr. Clarence Devadass (ed), Towards responsible stewardship Creation: An Asian Christian Approach, Office of Theological Concerns Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conference.

6. In the image and likeness of God: A Hope-Filled Anthropology, Anglican Communion Office, 2015.

7. Australian Bishops’ committee for Justice, Development and Peace, Christians and their duty towards nature.

8. Archbishop Roland Minnerath, Humanity’s responsibility toward creation – An ethical and anthropological challenge, pontifical academy of sciences, extra series 41, Vatican City 2014.

9.  Steven Bouma-Prediger, For the Beauty of the Earth, p. 186.