Can the Church Become a Climate Change Truth-Hearer and Truth-Teller?
Wrap-up Reflections on the UN Climate Summit
Reflections from Chris Elisara
When a global crisis is unfolding that threatens the undoing of creation, like the climate crisis emphatically does, the obvious role for the Church in world history at that moment is to be a clear and resounding truth-hearer and truth-teller in the service of the common good. I see truth-hearing as listening deeply to the climate crisis and understanding the truth of climate change, then acting accordingly with love, justice, courage, and creativity and innovation that leaves nobody behind; I see truth-telling as providing unambiguous, unvarnished, no-spin, true and trustworthy information about the contours of the climate crisis, including essential moral and ethical information so the public knows exactly what is hanging in the balance going into the climate negotiations. On the other side of the negotiations, the public is similarly equipped to judge whether the agreements attained at COP26 are adequate or not. Needless to say, there is a lot is at stake for both the common good, and for the Church, at these defining moments of world history.
The truth-hearing and truth-telling the Church can do in service to humanity is not an easy task. Climate change is complex, not only scientifically but politically, socially, culturally, ethically, and morally. Thus, to speak with integrity, as Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr. suggests, the Church must employ a community of experts who can take into consideration the full complexity of climate change while en route to “simplicity on the far side of complexity” where the unambiguous, unvarnished, no-spin, true and trustworthy information about the contours of the climate crisis can be distilled for proclamation. Who’s going to tell the public clearly and accurately the truth about climate change, if not God’s own institution on earth?
Christian Climate Observers Program North America meeting with Jesse Young from Senator Kerry’s Office of the U.S. Special Presidential Envoy for Climate (SPEC). We met to give letters from elementary school kids in Palo Alto to Senator Kerry about climate change.
Not only do I believe the Church can meet its obligation to tell the truth about climate change, but many Church sects and denominations are rising to this challenge, even if imperfectly. Pope Francis, for example, is leading the Catholics resolutely in this direction. The Anglicans and Episcopalians are striking out with determination, as are the United Methodists and other mainline denominations. The ACT Alliance unifies many mainline denominations and organizations into an effective advocacy coalition. It is evangelicals, albeit a minority predominately from the US, who have unfortunately prevaricated on climate change. As an evangelical, and one who has a leadership role regarding creation care and climate change, my exhortation is primarily directed at my own community in the US, and at myself to lead more effectively in the area of truth-hearing and truth-telling about climate change. There are signs, however, like the Young Evangelicals for Climate Action (EYCA) movement, the growing number of evangelical groups that attended COP26, and most heartening of all their intentional collaboration, that the tide may be slowly turning in our community too.
Why should the church bother with the arduous labor required to be trusted truth-hearers and truth-tellers about climate change, then inject itself into the contentious debate about what to do? While there are many reasons I will mention one based on my observations and experience walking the halls of COP26 where information is constantly being pumped out through pavilions, plenary speeches, presentations, panel discussions, and negotiators splitting hairs in committee meetings. If one is not careful all the information, argument, and counter argument can become overwhelming and can obscure what is at stake in all the hubbub, and why we need strong agreements at COP capable of changing our climate trajectory.
In fact, this is the very reason why fossil fuel lobbyists were the largest group of attendees at COP26 with more than two dozen more people than the largest national delegation, and to quote Fortune “outnumber by a margin of two-to-one the official UN delegation for indigenous groups, and those from Puerto Rico, Myanmar, Haiti, Philippines, Mozambique, Bahamas, Bangladesh, and Pakistan—the eight countries worst affected by climate change in the past two decades.” Their job, and they were very successful at doing it at COP26, is to water down negotiations commensurate with their interests. To quote global ambassador for Africans Rising for Justice, Peace & Dignity Kumi Naidoo, “This process has been corrupted to its core. This is as absurd as Alcoholics Anonymous having a global conference, and the largest delegation is the alcohol industry.”
My point isn’t those industries and their lobbyists should be excluded from negotiations, but we need to be able to hear them out and then be able to cut through any fog that unnecessarily delays the changes and transformations we need to undertake for a safer future. Maybe my pang for a way for your average person to navigate their way through the “swirling mists of climate information” is why the following metaphor came to mind while walking the cavernous halls of COP26.
I imagined the Church acting like a piercing fog horn cutting through all the noise and commotion at COP26 warning “do not wreck upon these rocks! This is where the danger is. Steer away from here!” She cries out, “know that millions of lives are in the balance. Millions more people will die and human misery will increase with each degree of temperature increase. So step up and make the right decisions.” She exclaims, “on this current trajectory whole cultures will live and die depending on the decisions you make. So too will the islands, forests, grassland, streams, and ocean those cultures are dependent on. So how do the solutions at COP26 that you’re proposing stack up against this generation’s ultimate challenge?”
Ormond Center presenting at COP26 about mobilizing the Christian community for clean energy.
The Church has a dual role not only to be truth-hearing and a truth-telling fog-horn, but to be “harbor lights” to the people who heed the fog-horn’s warning. The Church as harbor lights beckons, “come this way to safe harbor and see and learn what to do to turn the climate crisis around.” To a certain degree this is what the Ormond Center is doing though its studios for Placemaking, Transformational Enterprise & Investment, Thriving Congregations, NC Thrives, and Work for Common Good, but could it do more? Yes, it could, which brings me to this question: how could Duke Divinity School and Duke University help Christian leaders and denominations undertake the truth-hearing and truth-telling about climate that they need to do? To that end, I see the Placemaking Studio at the Ormond Center, along with other colleagues and students at the Divinity School, engaging deeply in the climate conversation at Duke. By working with other departments, centers, faculty, and students on climate change, I look forward to what the Ormond Center can contribute not only to future COPs, but on the ground in churches and communities all around NC and the US.
Other takeaways from COP26—
The Silver Lining is a Direction and Momentum Change
Secretary General of the World Evangelical Alliance, Bishop Dr. Thomas Schirrmacher at the Tuvalu Pavilion.
The final agreements at COP26 adds up to a very small temperature reduction from the pre-summit trajectory of a “2.6C to 2.7C warming by 2100 (with an uncertainty range of 2C to 3.6C)” to a post summit trajectory of a “2.4C (1.8C to 3.3C)” by 2100 (see Carbon Brief). A change of 0.3 degrees is minuscule, but the silver lining is its a 180 degree turn from the direction it was going. It is still a long way off limiting the maximum temperature increase to 1.5 degrees, but it is nevertheless a real shift in direction and momentum. The goal must now be to pick up the pace and accelerate the momentum in this new direction. Climate Action Tracker is a good website to learn which countries are picking up the pace of change, which countries are lagging, and what the overall trajectory for warming is.
Are We Measuring the Right Things?
What are we working for at COP26?
From observing the discourse, the dominant impression one gets is the primary goal is to hit certain numbers, a maximum 1.5 degree Celsius temperature increase and the corresponding number for a concentration of carbon in the atmosphere. Climate investment focuses on how much impact it has on reducing carbon and temperature rise. Every opportunity I had to talk with someone at COP26 I flipped this script on its head.
For example, members of the Ireland delegation were quite intrigued when I asked them “are you measuring the impact of carbon reduction on community well-being?” No, they are not. To which my follow-up comments were, “because you’re not measuring community well-being isn’t it a leap of faith that the government’s large investments to hit carbon reduction targets will in fact have an impact on community well-being? In other words, in the fight again the climate crisis you’re stopping one vital measurement short of what’s most important to people, the impact of climate change on their personal well-being and their community well-being. To put it another way, there’s one more link in the chain that needs examining--how does investment to reach a specific temperature and carbon number have an impact on community well-being?”
Is it possible to develop with communities how they want to improve their well-being, then design to achieve those goals in a linked up way through investing in decarbonization? Then set up the means to measure the community well-being targets that have been set so we know if progress is being made towards those goals, and at what rate. After all, isn’t what we’re working for at COP26 a tangible better future for people and the planet?
Measuring community well-being, then feeding that data into climate change policy and climate investable projects so we both decarbonize and improve our community well-being is not an easy thing to do. Nevertheless, I believe it’s very important to try. This is something the Ormond Center with other willing partners will investigate.
Make Cities Day the Third Day of COP, Not the Last Day
As the lead for the Ormond Center’s Studio for Placemaking, I am always happy to see cities come into focus as a locus for solutions to climate change. We are now an urban species, meaning in the last decade we crossed over from an equal number of people living in rural areas and cities to more people living in cities. The current trend of rapid global urbanization is projected to continue over the next 25-30 years when approximately 75 percent of the world’s population will live in cities. Many of the solutions for climate change, therefore, will need to be linked to urban design and placemaking where the majority of the world’s population will live. Time, reporting on cities day at COP26, curtly put it this way, “Countries Brought Promises to COP26. Cities Brought Actions.”
A whole day at COP26 was dedicated to cities and climate change challenges and solutions, only it was on the last full day of the COP and attendance was low. Given the importance of the way cities, towns, and villages will develop over the next 25-30 years for our climate future, I would like to see the day devoted to them given the prominence it deserves at future COPs and moved up to say the third day of the conference. Prime-time exposure to ideas like those presented by C40 (see this link) which is one example the many organizations at COP26 doing good work on this area, can only be a good thing.
We also know, however, that the well-being of cities is inseparable from the well-being of our rural and agricultural communities, which is a particular concern at the Ormond Center. Thus, attention needs to be applied holistically to urban, rural, and the rural-urban interface for effective place-based solutions to climate change. Perhaps at future COPs the Ormond Center could make meaningful contributions to discussions about repairing the rural-urban relationship and/or other pressing urban issues.
Art installation in the blue zone at COP26.
The Climate Vigil Campaign Gives Me Hope
Finally, the launch of the Climate Vigil Campaign remains the highlight of COP26 for me. There’s still half of the worship album to record, which will be released around April 2022. The local action part of the campaign will be coming online in 2022, and looking forward the vision of a million Christians holding a prayer vigil and advocating for climate transformation and justice at the National Mall the summer of 2023 has captured the imaginations of many people. If you did not experience the climate vigil online on November 6th, you can watch the recorded service at this link.
Curated resources to engage with the climate crisis
Dr. Norman Wirzba, Gilbert T. Rowe Distinguished Professor of Christian Theology at Duke Divinity School, wrote several pieces reflecting on COP26:
“After COP26: What should Christians do next?” published in Faith and Leadership
“Beyond COP26—A Plea for Justice” published by ABC Religion and Ethics
Nate Rauh-Bieri, Duke Divinity alumni (M.Div., 2012), also wrote several reflections about COP26:
“Was the Climate Change Conference in Glasgow a Success?”: An op-ed with Richard Killmer that was published in the Holland Sentinel
“After COP26, We Need Radical Faith, Hope, and Love” published in Do Justice
Participants in the Christian Climate Observers Program (CCOP) were challenged to write op-eds, letters to the editor, and blog posts about their experiences. Here are a few highlights:
“How Do We Get World Leaders to Listen? A faith perspective on justice inside and outside COP 26 negotiations” by Alaura Carter
“Being a Black Girl at COP, Where Do I Fit In? How can the US represent the nation in climate negotiations when the team negotiating doesn’t represent the nation?” by Alaura Carter
“Despair and Hope: My Reflections on COP26” by C. Parker Williams
“My Christian faith compels me to confront the moral implications of climate change” by Peter Fargo
“COP26: A Theologian’s Perspective” by Daniel Button