| Conservation Taskforce |
| Religious Leaders Call For Stewardship of Southern Forests This is a statement of the General Board of Church and Society of the United Methodist Church. Only General Conference speaks for the entire denomination. Clergy and religious leaders from across the South called on U.S. Senator Ernest F. Hollings (D-SC) today to help protect the regions disappearing forestlands by providing active leadership to "establish safeguards for our region that will ensure sound stewardship of our forests for future generations." Citing concern over the rapid unchecked growth of chip mills and the resulting clear cuts that feed them, the leaders invited Hollings to "join with us in seeking to protect and sustain God's good creation." Several leaders took the opportunity to request a face to face meeting with the Senator. The letter was prompted in large part by public outrage over the drastic increase in intensive logging driven by the rapid proliferation of the mills - highly automated facilities that grind trees into small flakes used in paper, pressboard, and rayon. In just 10 years, the number of chip mills in the region has more than tripled to at least 150, each devouring an average of 10,000 acres of forest a year. Combined, they consumed more than a million acres of trees in 1998. Paz Artaza-Regan, Environmental Justice Director for the United Methodist Church?s General Board of Church and Society noted that, "God's promises are not just for tomorrow, or even the next election cycle, but from generation to generation, forever and ever?we want to make sure that we give to our children's children a land that is as least as full of the wonder of creation as the one we know." The appeal came in an open letter to Hollings shortly after The Commission On Religion in Appalachia (CORA), unanimously passed a resolution calling for a moratorium on chip mill operations throughout the South. CORA is a coalition of 18 denominations and ten State Councils and Community of Churches including, Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. The delegation of religious leaders chose the appeal to Hollings because of his strong commitment to conservation and his pro-environment voting record in the Senate. Referencing words in both Christian and Jewish writings, the leaders called for stewardship, care for the common good, and justice for creation. "We are called to care not just for ourselves, but for the common good, to think of the 'social mortgage' placed on all land by its Creator," the leaders wrote. "Thus we need to ensure that forest policy protects the common good across our region, and not merely the narrow interests of the few." Contact: Paz Artaza-Regan (202) 488 5649 November 30, 1999 |
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| Plumbline SC |
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| "I will set a plumbline in the midst of my people." Amos 7:8 |