Coming from a general perspective, I think that religion tends to impact the environment in many different ways. The American Indian religion system believed in an extreme bond with the environment; they worshipped and respected the environment and believed that in return, it would give them what they needed at the right time. Many other religions, from the beginning of the existence of religion, have been highly focused on respecting the"'god" of the earth, many of which who are focused around the environment (god of rain, god of earth, god of growth, etc.) When properly practiced, religion and the environment can go hand in hand harmoniously, unless taken out of context.
Coming from a personal perspective, having a Christian faith, I personally think that there definitely is a correlation between the environment and religion. God teaches in the Bible about being good stewards of all that He has given us, which of course includes the environment. Abusing His creation is, in my opinion, not what He intended. He created the environment to provide for us and when mankind sinned against Him, we began using it in undesirable ways. We have free will to do as we please with the environment although many may try and respect it because it is a gift from their Creator. We have all sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, however, so I do not think it is right to judge people when they mess up or if they are not treating the environment how we personally think it should be treated. God is the only person who ultimately has the power to judge our decisions anyways. We are incapable of knowing exactly how He feels about this...
But regardless of religious background, we all tend to abuse the environment in some way or another. The most religious person may choose to drive a non-eco-friendly car, not recycle, and use tons of fertilizer on their lawn while a person who has no faith in religion whatsoever may recycle, ride a bike to work, and would never be caught dead using fertilizer on their lawn. Obviously a relationship to a higher power in any religion tends to make people question how they are living and what they are doing. In my opinion, life for something else other than the self tends to be a bit more intentional. Living life solely please yourself does not seem like a good way to live to me.
I think what it all comes down to is that fact that how one treats the environment ultimately becomes their decision. Their religion may have a direct impact in this decision, or it may not be something they even think about when considering the environment. If one believes that the environment was created by a higher power, than they are probably going to treat it as such and not trash what they are blessed to have. Once again, I definitely believe that the decision on when and how to incorporate religion and the environment should be taken on a case by case basis because this debate tends to be a personal one that means something different to each and every person.
I agree with Lauren in pretty much everything she said. I don't think that how you necessarily treat the environment has any correlation with how religious you are. It is interesting that many different religions have correlations to the environment, like Indian religions. But in what I personally believe, like Lauren, we are all going to hurt the environment in some way or another and it definitely has to be looked at through a case by case basis.
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