I like Mother Earth News a lot. It's practical, useful, and inspiring, and it encourages individuals to change the world by starting in their own homes. Hence I'm disturbed when an article seems to contradict the purpose of the magazine with a statement like this:

...the environment has lost some of its sizzle as an electoral issue. The biggest issues in the last election appear to have been terrorism, the Iraq war, abortion, affordable health care and gay marriage. Although anyone looking back on this election 100 years form now will see climate disruption as vastly more important than any of these issues, few people voted in 2004 on the basis of climate policies or any other environmental issues. April/May 2005

Besides being impossible to prove, it's unrealistic--let's fix the whole world first, then worry about the problems right here at home, in our hearts and our families. I'm quick to agree that our planet is in trouble (though perhaps not as dire as one might be led to think), but so is our society, and claiming that one issue is greater than the other could be catastrophic. What's the use of saving the earth if we neglect the children of God? Do we really care more about the baby whales than the baby humans?

Environmentalism is important--the slaughter of innocents should no more occur in the wild than it should in abortion clinics--and at this point we probably do need loud-mouthed leaders for the cause, but they shouldn't try to emphasize one issue by scoffing at the others. What Mother Earth News tries to do is tremendously effective when it works, and that is to teach people to live their individual lives as if they were as important as the entire world. God requires us to be good stewards of every aspect of our lives--we can't neglect one thing in favor of another.