Imagine you are a bird. I know it’s difficult, but try. You’ve laid your eggs and you and your partner (most birds mate for life) take turns caring for the nest so that the other can get food for sustenance. The small chicks finally hatch and now you’re really active, feeding them. Unbeknownst to you, a huge machine is advancing to destroy the nest and kill your babies, not to mention the habitat around you.
This is what will happen now that the White House has opened the habitats and species that inhabit them to oil and gas drilling by the simple change in the Endangered Species Act (ESA) of the word “harm.” According to Interior Secretary Berman, the birds and animals have “abused the original intent” of the ESA, which was to protect them.
In 1995 the Supreme Court upheld an interpretation of the ESA to include habitat, In other words, the ESA protects species against more than direct killing, but who knows with this Court what would happen. The National Mining Association applauded the Friday announcement. (Notice how they always come out on Fridays?) Everyone knows that birds don’t need trees to make nests.
Prayer for the Day
From the ways of self-deception and self-indulgence, O God,
May we turn aside to come before you and search our hearts.
Move us beyond our preoccupation with our own lives and fortunes
And awaken us to the world around us being destroyed by greed.
Empower us to take on the forces that would endanger your earth,
And save what is left of this world you have given us.
In the name of the One who took on corruption and greed,
Even Christ Jesus our Lord, Amen
Thoughts for the Day
We are at the precipice of losing 50 years of progress in the protection of America’s wildlife, because we know that the challenges for most animals are not that they’re getting shot.
Justin Pilot, former general counsel at Council on Environmental Quality
Threatened and endangered species are entirely dependent on healthy habitats. The proposed change would have dire consequences.
Bruce Kreft, North Dakota Game and Fish Department
But ask the animals and they will teach you, the birds of the air, and they will tell you;
Ask the plants of the earth, and they will teach you, and he fish of the sea will declare.
Who among all these does not know that the hand of the Lord has done this?
In God’s hand is the life every living thing, and the breath if every living being.
Job 12: 7-10