Here is a story well known, but worth reviewing and appreciating. It’s one to share as environmental concerns grow. Its implications are increasingly important. Essentially, in ecology as in economics, many actions and beliefs are interdependent. It’s difficult to do one thing that doesn’t affect others. This has major ethical as well as environmental implications.

This is surely true in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. An obvious example is the presence of wolves. There are ecological reasons to justify the reintroduction of wolves—but that predictably and necessarily raises divisive social and economic issues.

There are important lessons in this—and something to celebrate. America’s commitment to environmental stewardship was sanctified by the creation of Yellowstone National Park in 1872, the world’s first national park. Rumors of Yellowstone’s wonders had existed since the early 1800s. John Colter, honorably discharged from the Lewis and Clark expedition in 1806, returned to the Rockies in 1807 and explored greater Yellowstone while searching for furs.

His description seemed too bizarre to be believed, with its claims of geysers and the taint of sulfur and brimstone. Hence, Yellowstone was initially decried as “Colter’s hell.” Today it has 100 percent name recognition, nearly all positive. It provides excellent examples of the promises and pitfalls of environmental stewardship.

The 1984 book, Playing God in Yellowstone, suggests the problems. I produced the Yellowstone Primer after the 1988 Yellowstone fires to help clarify public thinking regarding the alleged destruction of the Park. Professor Jerry Johnson’s recent Science in Yellowstone describes Yellowstone’s gifts of nature and the complexities of managing them.

The environmental policy arena is inherently difficult, especially for those not trained in economics or policy analysis. This field combines scientific complexity with heavy emotional baggage, ingredients for error and acrimony. Clear thinking is essential for civility and sound policies.

For example, consider the many problems of wolf reintroduction in Yellowstone. Livestock predation near the Park is a predictable consequence of success. How do good shepherds and herdsmen respond? There is no clear and consensual answer, but basic economics helps clarify thinking.

The ethical and economic issues, so obvious in the Yellowstone context, are inherently difficult. However, interesting learning opportunities lurk in this mix. The Park is an ideal location for exploring worldwide problems in balancing contending ethical, ecological, and economic imperatives.

The text by the late theologian-economist Paul Heyne, The Economic Way of Thinking, offers guidance and a host of relevant examples easily applied to Yellowstone and to a worldwide range of environmental issues.

Many seminary professors and other religious leaders are concerned with ethical issues involving environmental and social justice. It is hard to understand and communicate the balancing of a broad range of environmental justice issues with natural and economic opportunities and constraints. Those concerned with stewardship can learn a great deal from Yellowstone experiences.

The summer of 2011 will be the fifth year that FREE has offered educational conferences on environmental stewardship for seminary professors and other religious leaders. All are held in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem comprises some 15,000,000 acres in our backyard. It offers an excellent setting in which religious leaders and others concerned with environmental stewardship and justice can explore and better understand contentious and vexing issues.

Our program for religious and community leaders, and those in religious media, has been extremely well received. Everyone concerned with environmental stewardship knows something about Yellowstone. Economic and policy analysis helps participants understand how to advance environmental stewardship in effective and responsible ways.

Yellowstone illustrates why reliance on good intentions and pious pronouncements are not sufficient to trump politics and parochial interests. Culture, institutions, and economic conditions influence management. Further, Yellowstone is especially awe-inspiring to religious individuals. Working with MSU professors, we will bring science and economics, as well as politics, to their stewardship questions.