The Buddhist Ecology Movement


Buddhists have begun to see religion as being critical to improve conservation, especially in forests. Thailand has the second highest rate of deforestation in Asia, and Buddhist monks have begun a movement to keep religion relevant in the process of conservation. Since Buddhism emphasizes the interdependence of all things and a connection with nature, their values align with conservation efforts. An article states on this movement that trees are a part of a monk’s ordination. After planting trees at the temple, they would be taken up to a mountain to be ordained. The ceremony was symbolic that trees are to be treated as equally as humans, and just as the monks were given orange robes, the trees were as well. The orange robe symbolized the newly ordained tree’s status, and by doing this, the tree is honored. Treating the trees as humans personifies the natural world, and just as one wouldn’t go around killing humans, the same should be true for trees and forests.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Judaism and Ecology (outside reading)

While looking up specific religions and their concepts of environmentalism based on their religious beliefs, I stumbled across the "J ewish Values on Climate Change & Energy" posted by a Religious Action Center of Judaism. They had similar views to the Catholics, which were that in Genesis we were given the land and told to protect and watch over it (Genesis 2:15). They also argued that the Talmudic concept bal tashchit, "do not destroy," was able to be used in conjunction with the argument that all land was God's, to decide that any act that destroyed the land was an act directly against God. They also used " Justice, justice shall you pursue" (Deuteronomy 16:20) to argue that the countries that are more responsible for climate change should be held to that problem, and therefore in charge of finding a solution. If poor countries are forced to bear the brunt of climate change (perhaps they are poor because their economy is majorly based on agricul...
Read more

Appalachia

In just a few short weeks I will be embarking on a two week journey on the Appalachian trail. This journey will take me through the hills of Tennesse and Virginia. On this trip I will be joined by classmates but leaving behind technology. In this journal I just wanted to share what my hopes are for the class and what I can learn about the spirituality of the trail. First, I'd love to have this journey teach me how to be less dependent on my phone. Hopefully being in nature like this will show me that it really is not necessary. The second thing I'd like to try to find on the trail a little bit more of myself. I'm dying to know what I will discover about myself and if I will see things in a different light after it. Overall, I'm incredibly excited just to experience something so pure and exciting at the same time.
Read more

Morality in Religion

Many of the world’s environmental problems come from human choices. In an article I read, an anthropologist relates human ecology to our emotions, and states that are our environmental choices are based on our emotions and our reasoning. Environmental management such as deforestation tactics can also be based around morality and making ethical choices, which religion has a powerful influence over. Many religions stem from the notions of making ethically right decisions, as they believe supernatural beings gave them the natural world such as forests and it is their obligation to take care of it.
Read more