Year 2008 has been declared as the United Nations Year of Planet Earth to draw attention to the far-reaching impact caused by climate change and global warming.  It is also the Year of Sanitation telling us that every third person in this world has no access to a toilet.  Yet another matter of grave concern is the soaring price of basic staples—wheat, corn, rice—up 50% or more in the last six months.  Human destiny is inextricably linked with the environment and conditioned by it.  Nature provides all resources needed for the normal welfare of the world population.  But the greed of humans has created problems of scarcity and imbalance and uneven distribution of natural resources.

The prevailing ecological crisis is very much a religious and spiritual issue and demands urgent and befitting response at that level.  The major religions of the world have a crucial role to guide humankind’s conduct and relationship with nature and the environment.  The essence of the Bahá’í approach to the current environmental crises is founded in the fundamental principle of the harmony of science and religion, which must be in balance. 

Science without religion fuels mindless materialism, while religion without science can push us into the abyss of superstition and blind belief. Science and technology gives us the tools to help us live in the physical world, but it is only religion and spirituality that can tell us how to use those tools for good rather than for evil.

For Bahá’ís, nature and all the creation reflect the qualities and attributes of the Creator, to be contemplated and admired in all their diversity.  Mercy and compassion must be shown not only to human beings, but to every living creature, and cruelty to animals is prohibited. The natural world is a unified system in which all beings are connected together. Cooperation and reciprocity are essential properties of nature.  Change is an ongoing phenomenon but disruptive and powerful change caused by human greed and thoughtlessness does not give nature time to adapt. 

We are organic with the world, and cannot segregate the human heart from the environment outside us.  Our inner life moulds the environment and is itself also deeply affected by it.  The spreading cancer of materialism and consumerism that has seen the mushrooming of the mall culture must be reversed.  Bahá’u’lláh says, “O friends! Quench ye the lamp of error, and kindle within your hearts the everlasting torch of divine guidance.
 For ere long the assayers of mankind shall accept naught but purest virtue and deeds of stainless holiness.”