24 HEALING CREATION HOPE
Furthermore , we have to ask
whether there is ‘ a Christian perspective ’ on a spectrum that can run between lament , through tweaking our ongoing lifestyles , to radical calls for action . And , of course , we have to acknowledge the understandable question that still persists in some Christian circles , particularly now that so many people face acute need and distress , which asks why we should give any time or resources to the non-human creation at all ?
But now that we know what David Attenborough ’ s recent programme rightly called ‘ the facts ’ of extinction , perhaps the biggest question of all is how Christian hope can mean much on a planet where all of life is so rapidly being depleted . We live in a time when species are being lost at unprecedented rates and even the formerly healthy populations of abundant living beings are disappearing at breakneck speed . 1 Many of the drivers for these global changes seem so inexorable , and some , like climate change , even appear now to be ‘ baked in ’ already : the greenhouse gases which already blanket our heating earth are due to exercise their effect for centuries to come . So is it possible to be hopeful and even joyful , as the poet and farmer Wendell Berry put it , ‘ even though you have considered all the facts ’?
THAT UNSEEN QUALITY OF HOPE WILL EXTEND TO OUR BEING UNABLE TO DETECT TRENDS WHICH MIGHT LEAD US TO BE OPTIMISTIC .
Expressions of hope
The small , personal hope
Over the years I have found three different and resilient reasons why living hope pushes through the cracks of even the most wretched of asphalt despair , even during considerable personal suffering . As I share them , I want to distinguish between two ways that hope expresses itself . The first is quite personal , and so will be quite variable ; we all react differently to the experience of loss . As we continue in our daily living , seeking the wisdom of God not only for the times in which we find ourselves , but for our own choices and endurance , hope can come as comfort . All of us take comfort in quite different ways .
Personally , I have found that it is frequently made up of the small and the local , what my daughter