Urban sprawl

A reader writes:

When I look at the growth in our country I see much urban sprawl. In my lifetime, I have seen many areas that used to be forest or field now paved over or “developed” into something that is often not pretty. What is the answer from the Church to this growth? How can we celebrate large population growth that leaves less natural areas and less beauty in our country?

If you are asking where the Church’s Center for Urban Planning is, there ain’t no such thing. The Church does not offer plans for micromanaging social and economic issues. The Church offers broad guidance based on foundational moral issues. It says things like “Feed the hungry” and welcome (and spearheads) missions to do this, but does not have a bureaucracy devoted to global hunger planning for all the states on planet earth. In the same way, the general teaching of the Church is that creation is to be cared for, not raped, and that human beings have both the right to use their environment for human welfare, and the responsibility to treat it well and wisely. They are to respect nature–including human nature–not treat it with either contempt or worship. It is not the case that population is a zero sum game and that the more people automatically means the more destruction of nature: