Are Western religions the cause of environmental problems?
The issue of religious attitudes toward nature was publicized in a widely-read 1967 paper titled “The Historic Roots of our Ecological Crisis,” published in Science by Lynn White Jr. This paper more generally critiqued Western societies for using science and technology to dominate and degrade their environment, but he accused Christianity in specific of enforcing a human-centered worldview. White was helpful in opening up religious perspective on the environment, science and technology, but he offered an overly simplistic view of Christianity and the influence it had on Western culture and attitudes toward nature. For example, he stated that “Especially in its Western form, Christianity is the most anthropocentric religion the world has seen;” and that for the ecological crisis, “Christianity bears a huge burden of guilt.” Note that these are emotionally charged, critical statements. He did identify an “alternative” Christian view in St. Francis of Assisi (d. 1226), whom he proposed as
