The other day, while scrolling X, formerly Twitter, I stumbled upon a post that I thought was a masterful reflection on one of the most concerning issues of our time.
In the post, the author was wondering why churches are attracted to wetlands when Jesus—whom those churches claim to represent—always ascended the mountain to pray.
Two days later, I saw a video of a ginormous church under construction in a reclaimed valley in Kigowa 2, Nakawa Division. Also in the video was a small truck—the famed ELF—and a truck-mounted crane which was helping to roof this structure. The caption of this video carried a plea from the residents of the area: drainage had been affected thereby compromising the foundations of their houses.
This is not the only one. While many churches are coming up in wetlands, the concerned authorities seem to have taken the monastic vow of silence. In a November 2022 Afrobarometer report titled Damage Control: Ugandans Want Government Action on environmental problems affecting their communities, different communities singled out trash disposal (especially plastics), pollution of water sources, and sanitation or human waste management as the most pressing environmental issues affecting them.
It is obvious that dumping soil in a wetland to create a social facility like a place of worship amplifies the above environmental concerns. What do these churches do about human waste management? Do they dig a pit latrine? And how deep can it be? Besides, for how long will such a latrine serve those who come to that church? You do not have to probe deeper to see the environmental calamity that the idea of a social facility in a wetland poses.
The lack of ecological intelligence aside, it is intriguing that churches would mastermind the desecration of the environment. The Christian Scriptures which are proclaimed in these wetlands have a lot to say about God’s creation and humanity’s responsibility for the world. In the creation narrative of the Bible, God creates man and puts him in the garden to work it and care for it. It continues to tell us that the created man does not waste time. He responds in obedience to his Creator by naming all the creatures that God had made. Central to creation theology is the idea that among Adam’s chief responsibilities is stewardship. “The Lord God took the man and put him in the Garden of Eden to work it and take care of it” (Gen 2:15).
What does it mean to take care of creation? Well, I will tell you what it does not mean. It doesn’t mean reclaiming swamps with reckless abandon. It also doesn’t mean dumping plastic bottles in waterways, channels, or even on roadsides. When God created the world, the Bible tells us that he looked at it and it was good. He was pleased with what he had done. He was happy with it, and so the responsibility of Adam, and all who come after him, is to maintain this divine order: to look after it and oversee its flourishing. The term for disrupting this order isecological sin.
It is an ecological sin because when a church is planted in a wetland, it constitutes an action against God, neighbour, and future generations. When pastors decide that they will glorify God in a wetland, they end up doing the opposite. God is not glorified when we choose to disobey him. Besides, a reclaimed wetland leading to flooding, cholera, and a disrupted ecosystem is a violation of what Jesus says is the second greatest commandment: To love your neighbour as yourself. When we kill the future of our children’s children with the misguided notion that we are worshipping God, we are not loving our neighbours, and neither are we stewarding God’s creation.
It seems to me that when it comes to the damaging work that has been done by religious communities on the environment, reports like the one I cited above will not move the needle, at least they have not. Christians need to know that their obedience to God goes beyond the moral platitudes they like to throw around. Christian communities are very good at pointing out sins—especially those relating to how people live—but so poor at their grasp of the breadth and length of what constitutes sin. This narrow conception of sin is why we are in this mess. It therefore seems logical to suggest that a better, and wholesome reading of the Scriptures can help save the situation.
The assumption, of course, is that those who wax eloquent about the Bible do what it says. Nonetheless, we have a better chance at both preserving the environment and growing in our faith when we let the wetlands grow yams, not churches. Nuwamanya Mategyero, Public theologian and Ph.D. in Homiletics student at Baylor University in Waco, Texas, USA. [email protected]
