The End of Suburbia III

Peak Oil: Denial
As I mentioned recently, I've begun a short series to think theologically about at least one aspect of Peak Oil.
Another good introduction can be found here, and for an excellent and accessible introduction including some Christian reflections, see here.

In my previous post, I briefly laid out the problem - a huge global economic downturn. The assumption of infinite potential growth requires the possibility of ever expanding energy. While there may be many other sources of energy we haven't yet considered or discovered how best to harness,* part of the issue is that there may be insufficient time to develop these. And even if the more optimistic estimates of some oil companies are accurate, we have only a few decades left. Weaning the global economy off oil and changing our assumptions about the extravagant use of energy might take that long. So even if the dire predictions prove false, there are still good reasons to be thinking about this issue today.
*A number of celebrated alternative energy sources actually require more energy input than they yield! Even those that generate a net gain are nowehere near as efficient as oil. There is no silver bullet single solution.

There are many sites that summarise the arguments over this issue (e.g. 1, 2, 3, 4, and so on),* and many more that make excellent suggestions about practical ways forward (Rev Sam recently composed a list of 11 pledges - worth a look).
*Let me know if I've missed your favourite site. There are many.

These discussions are important and I recommend gaining at least a little knowledge of the key factors involved. However, it is my contention that any 'solution' must first be theological because the problem first raised for most people when faced with some of the hard statistics is either denial or despair. I will deal with the latter in my next post. The former, when accompanied by a willingness to look closely at the arguments, is healthy up to a point, though becomes problematic when it reverts to blind faith in the market or some other talisman of protection.

For Christians, there is of course another kind of blind faith: that God would not let something so catastrophic occur. However, this too is blind faith without scriptural support. The fact is that God has and does allow civilisations to decline or self-destruct. Jeremiah warned against the blind faith of his compatriots in the temple, soon to be destroyed by the Babylonians, along with the nation itself. Jesus had a similar message for nationalists in his day. Many Christians in the time of Augustine believed that the "Christian" Roman Empire could not fail, so he spent much of City of God relativising the pretensions of Rome to immortality. After the fall of the Western empire, populations in many areas of Western Europe halved. The same area again lost between one and two thirds of its population during the Black Death, which was also accompanied by widespread social breakdown. To mention just one more example, perhaps a small-scale parable for Peak Oil can be found in the history of Easter Island. Ongoing de-forestation (amongst other factors) - at least partially to continue the production and installation of the enormous stone statues for which the island is famous - led to the collapse of a thriving civilisation and a population reduction of about 90% over a century.

Just as there is no reason the church ought to jump on the latest bandwagon and endorse every passing fad, there is also nothing pious about blind denial. If 'business as usual' is less the giddy sensation of flying through endless economic growth and more a deadly freefall, then the church ought not to ignore these issues. I am no expert and could be wrong, but I suspect the issues are worth more than a passing glance. Even if there are decades of cheap oil left, rather than years, our present energy-rich lifestyle is both unsustainable and unable to be extrapolated to the rest of the world. Wasteful excess may be passed off by the rich as a celebration of God's provision, but if the rich eat all the food before the poor arrive, then are we 'show[ing] contempt for the church of God and humiliat[ing] those who have nothing'? It is at least worth asking the question.

I have used this quote before, but it is worth repeating:

‘Eschatology is not a doctrine about history’s happy end…. No one can assure us that the worst will not happen. According to all the laws of experience: it will. We can only trust that even the end of the world hides a new beginning if we trust the God who calls into being the things that are not, and out of death creates new life.’

- Jürgen Moltmann, The Coming of God , 234.

Series so far: I; II; III, IV.
Ten points for the location of this sign.