Would Jesus buy an SUV?

Salt shakers
July 2001

Gardens of eatin'
Would Jesus have bought an SUV?

Would Jesus buy an SUV?
Ask some people about the gas-guzzling monster vehicles dominating the roads these days and they'll be quick to tell you they consider SUVs the spawn of Satan. Would it surprise you to know some of those people are members of the clergy?

In the Boston area local church leaders and their flocks launched a crusade to convince their neighbors to resist the sport-utility vehicles' devilish temptations. A hundred people turned out on a rainy Saturday, June 3, to protest at a strip of auto dealerships in Lynn, just north of Boston. They carried signs with messages like, "What would Jesus drive?" and "Test drive your feet."

"We're respectfully asking our neighbors not to buy sport-utility vehicles when they purchase their next cars," Bill McKibben said at the rally. McKibben is a Methodist and a fellow at Harvard University Divinity School's Center for the Study of Values in Public Life. "We want to let the auto dealers know that customers need cleaner choices," he added.

The Boston protesters argued sport-utility vehicles add to global warming and air pollution, and people of faith have a responsibility to protect the world God created. But they're not the only ones who think so.

At their annual meeting in June, the U.S. Catholic bishops issued a call for more action on the part of Americans and the United States to stop global warming and curb the "voracious consumerism" that feeds it. In Springfield, Mass. this spring, many of the United Church of Christ ministers signed pledges not to purchase SUVs. And three years ago a Protestant and Christian Orthodox group, the National Council of Churches, formed a faith-based global warming task force to convince Americans climate change is a religious issue. The group has spread to 18 states.—Anne Graber

For more info:
Global Climate Change: A Plea for Dialogue, Prudence, and the Common Good—from the U.S. bishops
Using faith to fight for the environment—from Salt of the Earth
United Church of Christ

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