For Creation Day I fired up the grill and sent a huge cloud of carbon dioxide into the air, cackling with delight. Al Gore may curse me, but the Icelandic volcano smoked extra hard as a testimony against the pagan tree-huggers best remembered in the Hitler video satire.
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From California:
The penchant for hopping on the pantheistic earth worship symbolism has a long acceptance in WELS. While still a member of a WELS congregation here in California, there was a likeable nice young summer vicar assigned to the congregation. When he arrived from Wisconsin, he had a bumper sticker widely used by what was called the Ecology Movement in the 60;s and into the 70's. It was a version of the flag done in green with the ecology "e" letter where the blue field of the flag would be. It's still around now and then.
Someone called attention to the inappropriateness of it especially since he would be considered to represent what the church stood for. He didn't see why it should be an issue, and thought it OK since to him it meant being a good steward of God's Creation. It was an example of the total disconnect on the part of WELS, that the world's symbols and methods had meaning, much of which was antithetical to Christianity. It seemed incredulous that WELS colleges and seminary would not prepare the students and seminarians to know and recognize that the message sent by displaying such symbols sent a message known and recognized by the world, not one of a naïve vicar's own interpretation. The bumper sticker remained until he returned to Wisconsin.
