Eco-Theology: Indoctrinating Kids, Breaking the Constitution

Introduction

Eco-theology in public schools introduces a pseudo-religious agenda under the guise of environmental education, violating the separation of church and state. It’s part of a broader trend where environmentalism acts as a religion, prioritizing spiritual ideology over scientific data. From Southwest Virginia, where I’ve seen technology improve lives while eco-activists push fear over facts, I’ll show how this indoctrination undermines education, threatens progress, and pushes an anti-human agenda. If eco-theology belongs in schools, then so does Bible study—fairness demands it.

Education should teach facts, not faith.

Eco-Theology in Education

The US Department of Education endorses eco-theology, suggesting environmental educators “incorporate religious resources” into curricula, using “ecotheology resources” and “faith-based environmental education programs” to find “common ground” between religion and environmentalism. [Ref: US Dept. of Education] This is a clear violation of church-state separation—eco-theology is religion, as a ResearchGate writer notes: “Religious traditions…provide the values, worldviews, or environmental ethics that shape the way…societies interact with nature.” If schools can teach eco-theology, they should also allow Bible study. I won’t stand for this double standard.

This focus on eco-theology comes at the expense of real education. When I taught community college (electrical and electronics), I gave open-book tests focused on solving real-world problems, but many students couldn’t read above a 6th–8th grade level or handle basic math like moving a decimal point. Some can’t even find Canada on a map, let alone Asia—where most pollution comes from today (e.g., China). Schools are failing at core skills while indoctrinating kids with eco-nonsense and race theories.

Anti-Technology and Anti-Human Agenda

Eco-activists behind this push aren’t interested in solutions. Proven technologies exist to produce power, grow food, and provide resources for a decent standard of living for all—yet they oppose every technical or scientific advancement. Instead, they seek a “spiritual revolution,” advocating population reduction (e.g., Paul Ehrlich’s 2023 call for a 3 billion global population) and lowering living standards to Mexico’s level. Bill McKibben, in *The End of Nature* (1989), argues against even replanting trees if it involves human intervention, insisting “no alteration of the environment by man is allowed.”

This anti-human stance mirrors the Gaia cultists’ view—humans are expendable. James Hansen’s “crimes against nature” rhetoric (2008) and Al Gore’s *Earth in the Balance* (1992) frame nature as sacred, with Gore linking ecology to “social justice” (i.e., socialism) and the “human spirit.” Science has nothing to do with spirituality—ecology has become a subjective social science bordering on religious superstition. The earth isn’t divine, and Gaia is a myth.

Failed Eco-Apocalyptic Predictions

Eco-theology’s fear-based narrative echoes decades of failed eco-apocalyptic predictions. In the 1970s, science fiction turned to eco-doom with fears of a coming ice age—the “latest scientific rave.” By the 1980s, political literature like *Nature’s End* (1987, Strieber and Kunetka), *The End of Nature* (1989, McKibben), and Gore’s *Earth in the Balance* (1992) predicted mass starvation, the end of oil, and societal collapse by 1980, then 1990, then 2000. I own these books, and every prediction failed.

These authors—Strieber, Kunetka, McKibben, Ehrlich, Gore, and John Kerry—pushed a pseudo-religious narrative of doom, akin to Stephen Schneider’s “scary scenarios” (1989) to gain media attention. Gore’s book opens with a spiritual lament: “We feel increasingly distant from our roots in the earth…we lost our feeling of connectedness to the rest of nature.” This isn’t science—it’s faith, fueling fear over facts, much like the eco-theology now infiltrating schools.

Nature's End 1987

Earth in the Balance by Al Gore

Technological Progress Under Threat

Technology has delivered real solutions, despite eco-activists’ opposition. Since the 1970s, environmental regulations and innovations have made air and water far cleaner—e.g., reduced emissions through new manufacturing processes like replacing metals with plastics. Fracking and other energy advancements have expanded resources, while the electronics revolution I’ve witnessed over 50 years has slashed energy and material use, adding capabilities once thought science fiction.

As a child in a poor Southwest Virginia household, I built batteries and generated hydrogen and oxygen from water, even made money repairing electronics. Books taught me science experiments—like building a hydrogen-oxygen fuel cell—showing technology’s potential. Yet Green Luddites and Gaia cultists threaten this progress, rejecting human-centric solutions. Their spiritual ideology—where Gaia doesn’t exist—puts ideology over innovation, indoctrinating kids with eco-theology instead of teaching them to solve real problems.

For more on eco-activists’ fear of technology, see my page Answering the Eco-Luddites Fear of Technology.

Share This Article

Conclusion

Eco-theology in public schools violates the Constitution by introducing a pseudo-religious agenda, indoctrinating students with fear instead of facts, and neglecting core education. It’s part of environmentalism’s broader religiosity—seen in Lovelock’s Gaia myth, Hansen’s moralism, and Gore’s spiritualism—that rejects technology and human progress. In Southwest Virginia, where I grew up learning science through books and experiments, I’ve seen technology improve lives while eco-activists push failed predictions and anti-human policies. For more on this pseudo-religious mindset, see my pages on Lovelock, Earth vs. Venus, and Hansen’s Alarmism, Ocean Currents, Climate, Ocean pH, and Environmentalism Religiosity. Let’s teach kids to think, not to worship nature.