Environmentalism as religion: analysis

Someone recently referred to my concern for our environment as quasi-religious in nature. In my recent reading, I found two interesting remarks on this:

For the environmentalist, the choice between paper or plastic is a moral issue, fraught with meaning. The attractiveness of the environmental movement is that, in a neutral universe without any inherent value or purpose, it provides universal values and meaning. The teleological end is human survival. That is a goal about which we can all agree. Along with faith in progress, environmentalism is perhaps the faith most expressive of a scientific mind. Regardless of our cultural, social, or economic backgrounds, we all have a stake in the survival of the single planet that sustains us all. And like the older faiths, our task is to humble our assertive egos and conform to the authority of the true and the good, in this case to the objective, universal reality of nature and its imperatives as they are increasingly revealed to us by science.

We achieve truth to the extent that our ideas more closely correspond, not with the stories of myth or the Forms of philosophy, but with what is the case. Ironically and ambiguously, with science, we seek control in order to conform. What is defines what we ought to do. Facts triumph over our subjective, private desires, provide an authoritative guide to our actions, and inform our connection with a universal human community. --Dennis Ford, The Search for Meaning: A Short History, 2007, pp. 102-103

And this:

To the environmentalist a day can be as full of religious observance as a monk's. He can choose his food to avoid chemicals, factory farming, and blighted origin. He can reject over-elaborate packaging, conscientiously reuse plastic bags and walk or cycle rather than drive. He can proselytize, campaign and demonstrate...For to the environmentalist, the world is suffused with baleful portents; it is enriched with meaning as in the vision of a saint. It is, above all, a world, a unity as opposed to the fragmentary, incomprehensible mass of facts provided by the scientist, or the modernist artist. --Bryan Appleyard, Understanding the Present: Science and the Soul of Modern Man, 1994, p. 126

There is a major difference between the science-based views of environmentalists and the mythical views of religious people: stubborn fact. Environmentalists (like me) would refer to concentrations of carbon dioxide, ice core drilling, surface ice area in Antarctica, etc., to establish the need for their "religion" while Christians would refer to a man dying and coming back from the dead. Pretty substantial differences in the worlds these two refer to: one is magical/mythical and the other empirical/scientific.

While I would disagree that religion is the same as environmentalism, I understand the parallels. As I was writing this very post (typing up the quotes above), I stumbled upon this article by Jeff Schweitzer at HuffPo about the fact that religion and morality don't mix well, which contained in it the very link between religion and environmentalism that the quotes explicate:

Faith has triumphed over reason, and we have suffered terribly as a result. In much of the world, humanity endures crowded poverty, taught that contraception is an affront to god. We rape our environment, told in Genesis that the earth's resources were put here for our exploitation and pleasure...Tearing down religion is useful only if a viable alternative is offered. We need to take the next step of suggesting solutions to humanity's most pressing problems in a world absent any god. We can do so by returning to core values based on our own evolutionary history, derived from our biological legacy free from myth and fable. We can move beyond faith and god to a life more complete...With freedom of course comes the obligation to act wisely and responsibly. We fulfill this duty first by taking a more modest view of our place in the world. When we see that humans are a natural part of the ecosystem, not above or separate from the environment, we will protect the resources that sustain us. When we reject the hubris and conceit of religion, we will redefine our relationship with each other without calling upon god to smite our enemies. When we understand that true morality is independent of religious doctrine, we will create a path toward a just society. We each have the power to create a life in which we no longer accept the arbitrary and destructive constraints of divine interference. The need to move beyond religion has never been more urgent. Our Earth is in crisis.

It seems clear from this article that Schweitzer sees a conflict between being religious and being an environmentalist, and he sees a natural (logical) relationship between being non-religious and being an environmentalist. Both logically and empirically, I think he's wrong about the former, as lots of religious people (albeit not many US religious white conservative Southerners) are environmentally-conscious and activists. But the latter relationship -- that non-religious people must wrap their heads around the reality of this world and this life -- is probably sound.