3.2.2 - Dominion and stewardship

Authority and care in creation

AQA places this topic inside Good conduct and key moral principles, so the key question is ethical and religious: what kind of responsibility does Christianity give human beings towards animals and the natural world?

Two terms carry the lesson.

The distinction matters. Dominion can sound like permission to control or use animals. Stewardship adds a limit: any authority is delegated, not absolute. A Christian may therefore argue that humans can use animals and natural resources, but not as if creation were merely private property or raw material.

The lesson should not be reduced to "Christians like nature". The precise issue is whether Christian dominion is best understood as mastery, care, accountability, or some combination of these.

Dominion Over Animals

The main biblical source for dominion is Genesis 1:26-28. In the creation narrative, humanity is made in the image of God and given dominion over fish, birds, cattle and living creatures. Psalm 8 develops a similar idea by placing animals under human authority within God's created order.

For many Christians, this gives human beings a distinctive position. Humans are not simply one animal species among others in moral terms. They have reason, moral agency, spiritual vocation and responsibility before God. This can support the view that humans may use animals for food, clothing, farming, work, companionship or medical benefit.

However, the source does not automatically mean unlimited exploitation. If dominion is given by God, then it is answerable to God's character and purposes. A ruler under God should not be cruel, wasteful or indifferent. The word can therefore be read in two main ways:

This is where AO2 begins. Dominion is not automatically anti-environmental, but it is morally dangerous if separated from stewardship. A responsible-rule account says that dominion is delegated authority, limiting ownership through accountability to God. A reasoned evaluation can test whether this limit adequately answers the mastery reading.

Stewardship Of Animals

Stewardship applies dominion to the everyday treatment of animals. If animals are created by God, they have value beyond their usefulness to humans. Proverbs 12:10 gives a simple biblical support for animal care: righteous conduct includes concern for one's animals.

Roman Catholic teaching is a clear source card for this balance.

This creates a moderate Christian position. Many Christians think it is legitimate to use animals for serious human goods, such as food, farming or medical research, but only with proportionate reason and humane treatment. Other Christians go further and argue for vegetarianism, veganism, stronger animal-welfare advocacy or opposition to factory farming because they see these as more faithful expressions of care for God's creatures.

The denominational and individual variation should be stated carefully. Christianity does not normally teach that animals and humans have identical moral status. Yet it also does not require the view that animals are morally worthless. The key tension is how to weigh human need, animal suffering and God's ownership of creation.

So a precise AO1 claim is: Christian stewardship of animals normally permits responsible human use, but it rejects absolute domination and needless suffering.

Stewardship Of The Environment

AQA also requires stewardship of the natural environment. Here the key biblical sources are Genesis 2:15 and Psalm 24:1.

Genesis 2:15 places the human being in the garden to work it and keep it. Christian environmental teaching often interprets this as cultivation plus protection. Psalm 24:1 adds the ownership claim: the earth belongs to God. Together, these sources support stewardship because humans use a world they did not create and do not finally own.

Pope Francis' Laudato si' is an important modern Catholic example. It rejects the idea that being made in God's image and given dominion justifies absolute domination over other creatures. It also links care for nature with care for poor and vulnerable people, because environmental damage often harms those with least power first.

That point keeps Christian stewardship from becoming a hobby for people who like the outdoors. It can become a social and moral responsibility: pollution, climate change, unsustainable consumption and habitat destruction affect neighbours, workers, future generations and non-human creatures.

Changing Environmental Understanding

The final phrase of the AQA wording is important: changing understandings of the effects of human activities on the environment have affected Christian views of stewardship.

Earlier Christian reflection often focused on local duties: care for land, kindness to animals, avoiding waste, feeding families, using resources well. Those duties still matter. The change is that modern climate science and ecology show human actions can have global, long-term and systemic effects. The IPCC, for example, states that human activities, especially greenhouse-gas emissions, have caused global warming. This changes the scale of moral responsibility.