Christians should be rescuing the planet from ecological disaster rather than simply trying to save souls for the next life, a bishop claims today.
The Rt Rev James Jones, the Bishop of Liverpool, is concerned that unless Christians help to orchestrate a new awareness the environment will suffer such catastrophic damage that it cannot be reversed. Privately, he estimates that may take as little as 50 years.
Given this chilling scenario, he argues, Christians have a religious obligation to act. They can only do so effectively if they abandon the "cul-de-sac" of addressing merely the spiritual needs of mankind.
In a new book, Jesus and the Earth, the bishop also asks whether environmental damage is so severe that we have passed the point of no return.
"For many people Christianity has been about securing a place in heaven," he says. "But when you read the Bible you discover that God is not just about new heavens but also a new Earth."
Bishop Jones, 55, reflects upon the fact that Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal, recently estimated that humanity had a 50-50 chance of surviving the 21st century.
"We are at a unique point in the planet's history," says the bishop. "In the past human actions have been trivial by comparison with the forces of nature. Now, it seems, human actions are no longer trivial because of such issues as the depletion of the ozone layer and the changes in climate.
"We need to think very seriously about what we are doing because we could be the ones that finally destroy the Earth. That is the possibility."
Society must acknowledge that "we cannot carry on consuming as we are, and cannot carry on treating the Earth as we are, without realising that what we sow we will reap".
The bishop, who recently visited Indian communities laid waste by super-cyclones, wants people of all faiths to heed warnings about the environment because they have "the ring of truth".
"I am not saying we must not consume . . . But what the tree in the Garden of Eden is about is to say we should be discerning consumers."