Greening and Gendering Health: Intersections of Religion and Ecology towards Humanity’s Well-being

Human health and environmental wellness are two major concerns in contemporary society. COVID-19, Ebola, Zika, and other ensuing zoonotic pandemics continue to attest that the preservation and survival of humans and the earth are ultimately linked. The breakdown of ecosystems is often conducive to breeding spaces not only for human pathogens but also depict reduced yields, scarcity of clean water, and air pollution, resulting in ozone depletion, all of which have increased the earth’s and human health susceptibility. Salvaging the wellness of earth and humanity thus becomes a shared ethical obligation of addressing human health concerns from an ecological viewpoint and addressing ecological concerns from a human health viewpoint. Greening health calls for a critical analysis of the intersections of religion and ecology to highlight humans’ contribution to the determinants of depletion and well-being. This paper utilizes an anthropocosmic approach that underlies that humans are intimately intertwined with the earth to highlight the intersections of religion and ecology, either in ecological and humanity’s damage or wellness. Concerted respect for the interrelationships of humans, the earth, the cosmos, and sacred worldviews is a promising path that may eventually lead to a new ecology of health. I argue that the ecology of health for the earth and humanity locates the moral agent right at the center of averting threats and destruction of humanity’s well-being and the wellness of the environment upon which we all depend on.