Faithfully yours - Keep the place clean

Details

Published on Saturday, September 26, 2015

By Neil Strohschein

The Neepawa Banner

This week’s column addresses a recurring issue in federal elections—how does a responsible society care for the environment?

Who has the best program to reduce waste, prevent pollution of the air and water and enable citizens to meet their needs without destroying the planet?

The opening words of the previous sentence identify what, in my view, is the real problem. We are designing and debating programs when we should be going out and doing something to fix the problems that we, over the past few decades have helped to cause.

The first thing we need to do is take this issue out of the hands of politicians. Their handing of environmental issues has proven one thing—take an issue, politicize it and you pollute it.

There is nothing complicated about caring for the environment. We don’t need to spend millions of dollars on studies, conferences, negotiations and protocols. What we need is people who will obey the one command our creator gave our first parents. “God planted a garden,” we read in Genesis 2:15; “took the man he had created and put him in the garden to till it and keep it.”

If those events had taken place today, I think God would have said something like this: “Here it is. This is your new home. Keep the place clean and if you make a mess, clean it up!”

This policy is easy to understand and can be applied to every Canadian regardless of age or sphere of influence. All we have to do is identify that part of the environment over which we have control—and then—keep it clean and if we make a mess, clean it up.

We begin by teaching this principle at home. We teach our children that they are responsible for their living space—their rooms. Keep them clean and if you make a mess, clean it up.

We also teach them that, along with the rest of their family, they must work together to care for the living space they share. Keep it clean, and if you make a mess, clean it up.

Those teachings are reinforced at school where students and teachers learn how to work together to care for their learning environment. Keep it clean and if you make a mess, clean it up.

When those students graduate from college and enter the work force, they will do what they were taught to do at home and in school. Whatever their occupation and wherever they work, they will look for ways to apply the principles they were taught at home and at school—keep your work place clean; and if you make a mess, clean it up.

If, by chance, some of these people should get into government, they won’t waste time talking about the need to care for the environment. Members of the governing party will look for ways to work together with other politicians, business leaders, labor unions and our First Nations people to build a strong and sustainable economy that cares for the planet and its people.

No longer will we worry about who has the best environmental program or who isn’t keeping his or her part of the latest treaty. Businesses will be able to grow. Farmers will be able to diversify their operations. Fossil fuels can be developed and pipelines can be built as long as those who do the work follow the rules—keep the place clean and if you make a mess, clean it up

That’s how environmental responsibility started. I think it’s time we got back to that.