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In an article in The Independent last year, the environmental scientist James Lovelock painted a dismal picture of the future: humanity has so degraded the environment "that climate change is already insoluble, and life on earth will never be the same again." And, "before this century is over, billions of us will die, and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic where the climate remains tolerable."

But then we turn the page and move on. National politics. Local politics. Social issues. Goings on in the Big Brother House. Pass on the World News (too miserable). What is on TV tonight? Business. Sport. Just keep turning the page and by the end of the paper, many of us will have forgotten about the cover story of doom and gloom.

It seems bizarre, in a society that has never been more informed and knowledgeable about everything, that we are still so apathetic towards the environment. A sociologist recently stated that we in the West are LIARs: people with Low-Information-Action-Ratio. We know that our own pollution is having disastrous effects on the environment on a global scale, yet we are ambivalent. Any determination we have to avoid destroying ecosystems, wasting resources and polluting the environment is negated by our overwhelming ability to produce waste. The beautiful variety of colour and texture on this planet is being transformed into grey, tepid sludge.

How do we deal with a crisis situation, such as climate change, that is global in scale, other than ignore it? Can we not cry out in alarm and anger and fear for our children's lives? Most of us see ourselves as small individuals within a vast machine of politics and industry. Who will listen to us? We are without a voice. We will just have to endure the consequences.

Yet the Christian story is one that allows us to cry out. Often, Christians have been criticised by environmentalists for telling a story that ignores present crises and only looks towards a heavenly home. But the true Christian story is one of a future with physical resurrection, in a new heaven and new earth. The new has broken into not just our individual lives, but into creation itself. If we do not care for God's creation now, do we deserve to do so in the future?

We hope in the One who is the redeemer of this broken creation. If we believe that God also desires the salvation of his whole creation, surely we must do more than mimic others in the rape of this planet?

If we cry out, will anyone hear us? I don't know. But the cry is evidence of an individual who is faithful to his or her vocation as an embodied image of the creator, a steward of this world.

Or, you can turn to the Sports section, or close this email without any resolve to change.

Gordon Brown