Did you catch the irony? The wildfires in California burned down Paradise? Then there’s another inferno right outside the “City of Angels,” as people in L.A. can hardly breathe. And isn’t it ironic that in a culture where money is God and celebrities are royalty, fires don’t discriminate as they destroy million dollar mansions in Malibu as if they were tar paper shacks?

At a gathering of the Inter-Faith Council earlier this week, we talked about the response of our faith traditions to the climate crisis. Of course we grieve with the victims. But thoughts and prayers are never enough. Then what? 

When asked about Christianity, I referred to the creation story in the first chapters of the Bible as the most important teaching. Two things are made clear there. We are not separate from creation. We are part of it. We are in relationship with the heavenly bodies as well as the things of the earth. We are instructed to be stewards. God places the first human beings in the Garden of Eden to tend and care for it. That’s our job, each and every one of us.

This Eden is paradise. All is provided. Adam and Eve just need to be humble enough and obedient enough to their better angels to resist burning paradise down. But isn’t it the human way to think we can do paradise better than God? We grasp what we aren’t meant to have and the next thing we know, paradise is gone and an angel with a flaming sword stands at the gate to keep us out.

A second understanding from the Christian tradition in responding to the climate crisis is important for me. It’s what the Catholic Church has called the “preferential option for the poor.” The poor are an obvious priority in the proclamations of the Hebrew prophets. That priority is also present in a Jesus whose primary audience is the common folk of his day, the peasant people, the “am ha’aretz.” Climate catastrophe clobbers the poor first and hardest.

Especially in the United States, where we are the second leading producer of greenhouse gases, we have been largely ignoring the cries of the poor who are already suffering from climate extremes and exploitation of resources. Island nations are sinking into the seas without relief. Hurricanes and cyclones batter communities around the globe with wind and high waters. Native nations loose their footing on melting permafrost and others lose lives and livelihood from fossil fuel extraction. As rising seas pollute fresh water and drought makes agriculture impossible, people are forced to flee. They become climate refugees, while more stable nations build walls to keep them out. 

If anything is clear from Scripture, we are asked to welcome the stranger and care for the poor and “the least of these,” as if for Christ.

Recently, in three different classes at two different colleges, I asked students whether they thought we would successfully resolve our climate problems in their lifetime. Out of some 50 students, not one raised their hand. None thought climate change a “hoax.” Some admitted they were in despair. None were willing to say they were optimistic, although one in the stunned silence that followed the poll, quietly said she was “hopeful.” 

A few days ago a group of 150 young people went to visit Nancy Pelosi at her D.C. office. They are part of a group called the Sunrise Movement. They are proposing a “Green New Deal” after the New Deal of the Roosevelt era. They want clean energy jobs and a fossil free economy. They want money out of politics and a voice for a livable future. Some 50 of them were arrested for “obstruction.” There’s certainly irony in that charge. Can you imagine anyplace where there is more “obstruction” than in the halls of Congress these days, and not from young people. 

Thank goodness for the young, hopeful enough to organize in groups like Sunrise and 350.org. Thank heavens for elders who support them and try to move decision makers to a more stable environment. Thank goodness for those who aid the poor and refugees in their time of need. And we can be grateful for those who continue to educate us about the reality of our changing planet.

One such educational opportunity is sponsored by the Brookings Inter-Faith Council on Thursday, Nov. 29, at the public library. At 7 p.m. there will be a showing of “A Sea Change.” It’s a story about the acidification of the oceans as told through a grandfather’s relationship with his grandson. The documentary debuted at the Smithsonian to a standing room only crowd in 2009 and has been informing audiences across the country ever since.

We owe it to our neighbors in Paradise to learn and do something, anything, to mitigate the threatening apocalypse.