If you go back and look at the original list of the WORLD’S RELIGIONS there are roughly 1.5 billion people that fall into 2 pretty blurry categories. Easiest to deal with are th 1.1 billion,
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
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Because I write about them everyday when I am not writing directly about Energy Issues, I am not going to do a post here.. The Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth and most of the other environmental nonprofits are of this group. Much harder to discuss though are religions like those of mainland China.
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Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
Chinese Traditional Religion causes clouds in westerner’s minds. I mean it would be so easy to get all New Earthy here with cliches and stuff. Or make rude references to the television program Kung FU and being like a “grasshopper” or make fun of Shanghai Knights and Jackie Chan
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_folk_religion
Western views
The absence of a proper name for this religion, associated with the absence of any canonical literature, have for a long time caused Chinese folk religion to be viewed by Westerners as a popularized version of an “authentic” religion, in the same way that the cult of the saints is viewed. Both in China and outside, adherents often describe themselves, or are described by others, as followers of Buddhism, Taoism, Confucianism, or a mix among these.
http://www.blurtit.com/q738169.html
Blurtit expands on this definition:
“Worship of animals, the sun, moon, earth, the heavens and stars has been a tradition of this religion. Various devotions in celebration of legends, festivals, folk gods and goddesses has been part of the Chinese culture for centuries. Mythical figures, “saints,” immortals, and demigods are part of the Chinese tradition.”
The real problem for many of the world’s religions from a Jewish/Christian/Islam perspective is that they lack a Messianic Character (Christ); they are largely oral and interpretive in nature; and they are not monetheistic. This is true of a post already put up that dealt with Hinduism, but even more true of Jainism and some others.
Yet many of these religions directly address the environment as being much more important than the current leaders of the food chain, and caution against the over use of resources such as energy.
I rarely ever get lucky, but on this topic I did. a guy named Austin Arensberg put together this enormous list of groups, mostly local NGOs, working on environmental issues in China and sharing a traditional perspective.
A partial list includes:
Green Earth Volunteers
http://www.virtualfoundation.org/about/consortium/greenearth.html
Green Watershed
http://www.greenwatershed.org
Green River
http://www.green-river.org/
Nu River Project
http://www.nujiang.ngo.cn
China Rivers Network
http://www.chinarivers.ngo.cn
Wild China
http://www.wildchina.com
Han Hai Sha: Volunteer Website Dedicated to Desertification in China
http://www.desert.org.cn
China Green Foundation
Green Camel
http://www.greencamel.ngo.cn/
Perspectives plateau
www.plateauperspectives.org
Contact: Marc Foggin
Phone: +86 0 976 889 2104
Email: marc_foggin@hotmail.com
Green Khampa
Contact: Mr. Ding Xiaotao
Phone: +(86) (0) 836 283 9119
gzdingxiaotao@vip.sina.com
Friends of Grasslands
Contact: Mr. DA Lintai
Phone: +(86) (0) 471 4312480
steppecl@eyou.com
Green Campbell – Lanzhou Grasslands Research Institute
Gansu Grassland Ecological Research Institute
Contact: Dr. Liang Tiangang
Phone: + (86) (0) 0931 8662047, Fax: 86 0931 8497314
ggeri@public.lz.gs.cn
Address: P.O. Box 61, 730020, Lanzhou, Gansu Province
Snowland Great Rivers Environmental Protection Association
www.snowland-great-rivers.org
Contact: Gara Sandrup Rokai
Phone: + (86) (0) 971 6116 843, 0976 882 9088
Fax: 0976-8829099
uyohata@sina.com ,
okphone2001@yahoo.com
Upper Yangtze Conservation Development Organisation
China Vetiver Network
China Biodiversity Conservation Foundation
Fujian Bird-watching Society
Fujian Fire Bird?
HongKong Bird-Watching Society
Xiamen Bird-Watching Society
Shenzhen Bird-Watching Society
Wetland of the Dongting Lake?
Center for Biodiversity and Indigenous Knowledge
(http://www.cbik.org/)
Siberian Tiger Park
Wuhan Baiji Dolphin Conservation Foundation
China Wildlife Conservation Association
Nature and Culture Conservation Club
Green Dalian
Friends of Nature
And a 2006 Worldwatch Institute article makes this point:
http://www.worldwatch.org/node/3870
In this 2006 article by Lila Buckley, titled:
Maturing Environmental Movement Takes Uniquely Chinese Approach
“While many of their issues are familiar to activists around the world, environmentalists in China recognize that they must forge their own path. Speaking at the NGO Forum, Mei Yue, media director for Greenpeace China, explained how her organization tries to take advantage of environmental principles embedded in Chinese culture and philosophy. “Thinking locally in China involves traditional ideas of humanity in harmony with nature,” she said, noting that environmentalists need to stress more broadly the notion that this harmony is out of balance. “Then we can come up with uniquely Chinese understandings of new terms like ‘ecology’ and ‘sustainable development’ in order to solve our problems,” Mei explained.”
Unfortunately hindsight paints a less than hopeful Picture. The main point of the article is that Chinese Environmentalist are ready to dig in and fight. This last year brought global warming to China producing the first Heavey snowstorms during their New Year and ruining everyone’s holidays. The drought continued in the west and their deserts expanded and they drove the price of oil up over a 100$$$ per barrel.
And as usual the pretty pictures too:
