In September 2019, in the light of the climate and loss of biodiversity crises, Christ Church launched an “Eco -Group”, with the aim of examining our own responsibilities in this area. By working towards the A Rocha Eco-Church awards, we are looking at all aspects of church life, from the way we use our buildings and grounds to the worship and teaching and our individual lifestyles. Through regular input into Church meeting and items in our monthly magazine, Comment, these issues are kept in the foreground of our thinking. The most recent four articles in Comment can be found below.
JUNE 2023 - We have now been awarded the A Rocha Bronze Award - Certificate here
Item from March 2025
A piece of research that caught my eye recently has looked at the relationship between Britain’s three largest religious communities and their attitudes towards environmental matters. It turns out that it is Hindus who are at the forefront of environmental activism, engaging in eco-friendly actions at higher rates than other faith groups.
The research was carried out by the Institute for the Impact of Faith in Life. Amanda Murjan, a research associate, writes “Hinduism’s emphasis on the interconnectedness of all existence fosters a deep-rooted environmental ethic, where nature is not merely a resource but a sacred entity. The belief that God is in everything connects humanity with all existence, reinforcing an intrinsic responsibility toward conservation.”
While 92% of Muslims believe their faith requires them to care for the earth, the figure for Christians is 82%. And it is Christians who apparently engage in the lowest levels of conservation action. The research also showed that 31% of Christians deny climate breakdown – the highest among these three faith groups. A Christian belief that God will ultimately restore the world maybe contributes to this attitude.
Though people of faith do in the main believe they are responsible for caring for the Earth, this report suggests that their actual environmental actions do not in fact differ significantly from those without faith.
Interesting.
Eco-tip of the month
As thoughts turn to our gardens, remember to use peat-free compost only.
Item from February 2025
Climate news continues to come thick and fast with the devastating fires in California the latest disaster to hit the headlines. While the Santa Ana winds and wild fires are a natural part of the ecology of California, the strength of the hurricane force winds and the time of year – the usual season for wild fires is late summer and autumn – is unprecedented and can be attributed to human induced climate change. Fires of this type and magnitude have never been experienced before during California’s winter.
While a few powerful people continue to describe climate change as a “scam”, it is significant that the churches are stepping up to argue for the changes that we all need to make if we are to protect creation and the planet for future generations. Out of control climate change would threaten our very existence. Specifically, most denominations have set ambitious targets for reducing their own carbon emissions. The URC, for instance, has resolved to “act urgently to reduce carbon emissions across the whole of church life in order to reach net zero emissions of greenhouse gases by 2030.” The Church of England and the Methodist Church have also set targets of net zero emissions by 2030, and the Baptist Church by 2035.
A Rocha, the organisation which runs the Eco-Church programme, has recently updated its survey, a tool which helps us to see the steps that we should consider taking. It covers everything from reducing our energy use, phasing out the use of fossil fuels, how we use our grounds, the food we eat and the products we buy to the place of creation care in our worship and teaching, how we engage with the wider community or environmental campaigns, the way we travel and live our lives individually. It is clear that caring for creation – nature, the environment and the climate – whether in church life or as individuals, is not for a few enthusiasts, but something we all need to commit to. 2030 does not feel very far away and, if we at Christ Church are to reach net zero by then, we have work to do!
Stop Press On 17th January the Met Office published figures showing that global CO2 emissions in 2024 did not come down but were the highest on record.
Item from December 2024
It is difficult to know where to begin this month, with climate events and news coming thick and fast.
COP 29, held in Baku, Azerbaijan, while over-running by a couple of days, has just concluded. One of the main aims was to produce an agreement on finance to be committed by the richer countries of the world to the poorest to help them develop their own green economies and adapt to the climate change caused by our emissions. Some agreement was finally achieved, but the sums involved are far from what is considered adequate by developing countries, who have branded the deal a “betrayal”. The conference has been difficult, with controversies over, for instance, the significant participation by oil and gas producing companies and attempts by Saudi Arabia and other fossil fuel producing countries to even pull back from last year’s modest resolution to “transition away from fossil fuels.”
Just to explain, COP stands for “Conference of the Parties” and "Parties" refers to the countries that have ratified a treaty called the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change). That document was signed back in 1992 by almost 200 countries and is generally known as the Paris agreement. Representatives of these countries meet every year to negotiate the best approaches to tackling the root causes of climate change. But, even when modest commitments are agreed, they have not always been achieved.
With extreme and damaging weather events becoming increasingly common, the flash floods in Spain and severe hurricanes in the Southern United States being just two of the latest examples, it becomes ever more urgent that the world tackles the issue with speed and determination. 2024 is set to become the warmest on record while planet-heating emissions are not going down but actually increasing to their highest level ever this year. In stark contrast, emissions have to fall by 43% by 2030 for the world to have any chance of keeping the temperature increase down to the 1.5 degrees target. Some experts think we are already too late for this. The election of a climate change denier as the next president of the US - who calls the climate crisis “a big hoax” and has announced his intention to leave the Paris agreement - is scarcely encouraging.
A piece of news I have found sad is discovering the words that have been removed from the Oxford Junior Dictionary and those that have replaced them. Of course, the job of a dictionary is not to dictate but to reflect the reality of language used today, but I wonder what it says about the experience of today’s children that words that have gone include acorn, ash, beech, bluebell, buttercup, catkin, conker, cowslip, cygnet, dandelion, heron, ivy, kingfisher, lark, mistletoe, nectar and newt. The words taking their places include blog, broadband, bullet-point, celebrity, chatroom, committee, cut-and-paste, MP3 player and voice-mail.
We do pray that God will lead the leaders of nations and industries at this critical time, and all of us to do whatever we can, in our small ways, to care for the natural world of which we are a part.
Item from October 2024
“The central geopolitical challenge of our age”?
On 17th September an important speech about the impact of human induced climate change was made by a Cabinet minister. The interesting thing is that this was not a minister with a special responsibility for climate change, but David Lammy, the Foreign Secretary.
Mr Lammy described the climate and nature emergency as “the most profound and universal source of global disorder” and “the central geopolitical challenge of our age.” There has been a tendency for climate and nature policy to be seen as separate from other issues, but, he argued, the threats to global stability and prosperity are so great that climate policy has to be integral to foreign policy.
“Let’s take migration.” he said. “We are already seeing that climate change is uprooting communities across the world. And by 2050, the World Bank’s worst-case estimate is that climate change could drive 200 million people to leave their homes.” It will take global cooperation to deal with the implications of this. “Or we could take health. The World Health Organisation says climate change is now the biggest threat to human health.”
We are well aware of the inequalities between those countries who have contributed most to global warming and those who have contributed least but suffer some of the worst effects. “Time and time and again,” Mr Lammy said, “it is the most vulnerable who bear the brunt of this crisis.” The BBC’s Climate Editor, Justin Rowlatt, in the same week, demonstrated this starkly in a report from Somalia, which has recently suffered from both drought and flooding, exacerbating the problems of conflict and poverty already faced by the country. While no single weather event can be attributed precisely to climate change, their increasing frequency and severity is exactly what climate scientists have been predicting. Somalia, he pointed out, has produced the same amount of greenhouse gas emissions since the 1950s as the USA produces in just 3 days. An astonishing statistic.
Organisations such as Christian Aid have campaigned for some time on the issue of climate justice. This means richer nations accepting the part they have played in causing the climate emergency and their responsibility to support poorer nations, not only in dealing with its effects but also with their own developments towards sustainable energy. This is in our interests as well as theirs. Mr Lammy argued “There will be no global stability without climate stability. And there will be no climate stability without a more equal partnership between the Global North and the Global South.”
With the potential of climate change to affect migration, conflict and economies world-wide, it is encouraging to see it being considered, not as a side issue, but in the mainstream of our foreign policy.