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The eco-bishop: a hallelujah for environmental protection
Boschof Eichstätt lives for climate protection. In the 1990s he made sure that the entire agriculture of the Plankstetten monastery converted to organic guidelines.
© Armin Weigel / Picture Alliance
Climate, environmental protection and the church have nothing to do with each other – right? Wrong, says Gregor Maria Hanke, Bishop of Eichstätt. Because preserving God’s creation is one of the guidelines of the Christian faith, says the “eco-bishop”.
Christianity and environmental awareness go hand in hand – at least that’s how the Bishop of Eichstätt sees it. Gregor Maria Hanke does a lot in his diocese to act as climate-neutral as possible – and already in the nineties converted the entire agriculture of the Plankstetten monastery to organic guidelines. At that time he was still considered an eccentric for his way, according to Hanke, who is also known as the “eco-bishop”. To treat our world with care and to keep it that way for many years to come is, in his eyes, one of the most important tasks of Christians around the world. At the moment, however, we are doing far too little to do justice to this. “We cannot praise and praise the Creator in church and then we go out with the tractor and sprinkle artificial fertilizers and spray with poison,” says Hanke in the podcast, “important today”.
When it comes to climate protection, we have to learn to do without
When it comes to climate protection, we shouldn’t hope that God – whoever – will take care of it for us. Rather, God needs us so that we can preserve his creation, says the bishop of Eichstätt. This also includes accepting that climate protection also means the end of our prosperity in its current form. “If you eat regionally, seasonally, then everything is no longer available at all times.” We should learn to do without, said the bishop. “Having is not everything, the heart offers much more.” Podcast host Michel Abdollahi also asked him why the party that even has Christianity in its name is doing the least for the environment. And whether the Greens are perhaps not even the more Christian party.
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