Creation Care and Justice, Wright p. 270

We must exercise justice, because environmental action is a form of defending the weak against the strong, the defenceless against the powerful, the violated against the attacker, the voiceless against the stridency of the greedy. These too are features of the character of God as expressed in his exercise of justice. Psalm 145 includes God's provision for all his creatures in its definition of his righteousness as well as his love (Ps. 145:13-17). In fact, it places God's care for creation in precise parallel with his liberating and vindicating acts of justice for his people- thus bringing the creational and redemptive traditions of the Old Testament together in beautiful harmony.

So it is not surprising, then, that when the Old Testament comes to define the marks of the righteous person, it does not stop at a practical concern for poor and needy humans (though that is, of course, the dominant note). It is true that "the righteous care about justice for the poor" (Prov. 29:7). But the sage also makes the warmhearted observation that the "righteous care for the needs of their animals" (12:10). Biblical mission is as holistic as biblical righteousness.