Climate Justice Clips: Archbishop Rowan Williams on ‘Fashioning a Christian Response’ to the Climate Crisis

by Jarrod McKenna 12-16-2009

Many would have read reports of Rowan Williams’s wonderful sermon in Copenhagen. Below are some of my favorite quotes. What some may have missed is this fantastic talk he gave. Pencil in sometime, make a cup of tea, and prayer-sit back as Rowan Williams outlines “The Climate Crisis: Fashioning a Christian Response.”

Love casts out fear. If we begin from the belief that God wants us to rejoice and delight in the created world, our basic attitude to the environment will not be anxiety or the desperate search for ways of controlling it; it will be the excited and hopeful search for understanding it and honouring its goodness and its complex, interdependent beauty.

In this season of Advent, we renew our confident hope that such a future is possible. We give thanks for the Christmas gift of Jesus Christ that has broken through our selfishness and begun the work of our liberation. We reaffirm our conviction and commitment in the name of love; and we say ‘don’t be afraid’ to all who stand uncertainly on the edge of decision. Don’t be afraid; act for the sake of love.

Love casts out fear. The truth is that what is most likely to get us to take the right decisions for our global future is love.

For the best daily coverage of what is happening at COP 15, visit here. And feel free to join EPYC’s facebook group.

SERIES INTRO: This year alone, EPYC has run nonviolent climate justice workshops with more than 8,000 young people (most with little or no contact with Christianity). The workshops invite them amid our ecological crisis to become [eco]prophets, and introduce them to an understanding of Christianity that provides a spirituality of compassionate engagement modeled on Jesus (rather than indifferent escapism dressed up in Jesus-drag that simply reflects the patterns of the world). In the countdown to the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen (COP15), these are some of the most popular, inspiring, informative, and provocative video clips we have used in our workshops.

Feel free to post them on your blog, send them to friends, and share them in your sermons, small groups, and Bible studies. Let them help you “think critically, plot creatively, and act compassionately” in witnessing to the gospel’s message of good news to our warming world — not a lubricant for the destruction of God’s good creation.

And join us in praying with Tim Costello and Brian McLaren for climate justice for the poor at Copenhagen.

Jarrod McKenna is seeking to live God’s love as a dad, husband, brother, activist trainer, and [eco]evangelist. He is a co-founder of the Peace Tree Community serving with the marginalised in one of the poorest of areas in his city, in Western Australia heads up an award-winning multi-faith youth service initiative called Together for Humanity, and is the founder and creative director of Empowering Peacemakers (E.P.Y.C.), for which he has received an Australian peace award in his work for empowering a generation of [eco]evangelists and peace prophets.

Categories: Environment

Tags: climate change conference, climate justice, COP15, Global, Jesus, rowan williams, sermons, united nations climate change conference, warming

BuckeyeDon

Who's got the beam? Who's the one who's insulted, demeaned, and name-called? Who's the one who continues doing it even when asked politely to stop?

squeaky

Fine. Show me, then, where I have called you, or anyone else names.

You know, you could just recognize how rude you have been and apologize. I don't see anyone else here using dismissive rhetoric and insults to get their points across, and that includes almost all the others who also disagree that climate change is caused by humans.

Please explain why it is that you, and many other Conservatives, think this is a useful tactic. I'd really be interested to know, because I don't get it.

fundamentalist

You're missing the point. Yes, the natural world absorbs most of what it produces at the moment. But it doesn't always do so. That's why the ice core data show huge increases and decreases over time in atmospheric CO2. The CO2 concentrations could not increase and decrease if there was a delicate balance. During some periods nature has to contribute a great deal more carbon than it absorbs in order for CO2 to build up. The current build up in CO2 and temps began over 200 years ago. Human contribution has been very small.

When the natural cooling phase of the cycle resumes, the deficit in naturally produced CO2 will overwhelm human contributions and they won't matter, just as they don't matter today.

BuckeyeDon

It's inaccurate to say that 98% of the current warming comes from the natural cycle. Without the human contribution, there likely would have been no warming. Again, it's the accumulation of CO2 in the atmosphere that's causing the warming. That isn't coming from the natural carbon cycle; without the human input, the natural inputs would maintain atmospheric CO2 levels at approximately the same level they were before humans began burning large amounts of fossil fuels.

BuckeyeDon

But that's precisely the point. That 3% from humans is making a huge difference. All you have to do to see this is to look at how CO2 levels have increased. The increase didn't come from natural fluctuations, did it? It came from humans. And it is making a huge difference.

Positive feedback loops that have been unleashed because of this human contribution can indeed build up to destroy the earth as we know it (not the planet itself), and may be doing so even as we write here.

fundamentalist

Squeaky, remember to remove the beam from your own eye....

fundamentalist

You're not trying to understand my point, but point out perceived inconsistencies. My point was that the human contribution is so tiny that once the earth begins the cooling phase of its normal cycle, the tiny amount that humans contribute won't make any difference. And because 98% of the current warming comes from the natural cycle, the tiny contributions from humans doesn't make any difference either.

The climate is not fragile, but very robust. A 2.3% contributions from humans can not possibly tip the balance and destroy the planet.

WaveTossed

"I couldn't agree with you more. It is the politicized nature of this debate that is most discouraging to me. I cringe when I read the anti-liberal comments that regularly appear on skeptical blogs. And I cringe when I hear the accusation that hard-working, honest scientists are shills for the oil and coal industry."

Thanks, thanks!! I had just about given up on the climate-change debate -- too many people castigating me because I didn't accept their views hook, line and sinker.

BuckeyeDon

Should I break this to you gently, fundamentalist? You just conceded my point. Let me ask you: if the human production of CO2 were not present, could any natural fluctuations swamp the system? Take a careful look at your last sentence. What is the rogue element here? Is it the natural fluctuation or is it the human-generated CO2?

I think you know the answer to that question.

squeaky

Here-here!

squeaky

And by the way, you have lost any shred of credence you had with me because of your insulting tone. If you are trying to convince people of your viewpoint, you might want to try respectful dialogue for a change. If you need an example, check out RobTam's posts. I don't agree with him, but never once has he called anyone a name or used a disrespectful, dismissive, mocking tone. Almost all of your posts have done that.

Answer this--why should I even bother looking at any evidence put forth by someone who insults me, and who continues to insult me even when called on it several times? And if your arguments are ignored because of your rhetoric, why do you insist on using that tactic? What could you possible gain from it, other than being ignored?

Did you even read the Code of Conduct?

fundamentalist

But that's the whole point of the debate. The system is not in balance. It fluctuates wildly. Just look at the ice core data on CO2 and temps. Because human produced carbon is such a small part of the total, and CO2 a small part of total GHG's, it would be very easy for small changes in the natural fluctuation of CO2 to overwhelm the human produced CO2.

squeaky

I would think you would be able to show other evidence than just a Wiki article and an article from a highly biased source when asked for other evidence, then.

fundamentalist

No Sqeaky, it's not all of the evidence. As others have demonstrated, there are thousands of articles against AGW from real scientists. Did you even look at the chart? It's from NASA.

RobTam

I couldn't agree with you more. It is the politicized nature of this debate that is most discouraging to me. I cringe when I read the anti-liberal comments that regularly appear on skeptical blogs. And I cringe when I hear the accusation that hard-working, honest scientists are shills for the oil and coal industry. Let's get beyond the name-calling on both sides, ignore the Sarah Palin's and Al Gore's of this world, and allow a legitimate and transparent scientific process to establish what is really happening in our atmosphere.

BuckeyeDon

It doesn't take a very large percentage to overwhelm a system that would be in balance without the strain of additional inputs that it cannot absorb.

squeaky

Really? All you have for evidence is a Wiki article and an article from a heavily biased source?

Anothernonymous

Then McIntyre is to be commended. If I read you correctly, RobTam, you are still undecided on this issue, and that is commendable as well.

What bothers me about the so-called debate on global warming is that it appears to be almost entirely political. Those who claim to be "skeptics" are almost without exception free-market economists, who clearly don't like the very idea of man-made global warming, and are willing to grasp at any straw to call it into question. I don't doubt that there is a reflexive instinct among liberals to fight back in kind, although I still believe those who claim that AGW exists and is a serious threat have the weight of the evidence on their side.

What I wish the "skeptics" would realize is that they aren't convincing anybody with their stridency and name-calling. What they are doing is making their opponents angry, determined, and far less likely to listen to rational arguments, should such be advanced.

I will second Squeaky's vote of thanks to you for taking a less militant, more rational tone.

fundamentalist

Check out the article in Wikipedia called the Carbon Cycle. The chart is from NASA. Compare the human contributions to atmospheric carbon to the contributions by nature. Humans contribute 2.6%.

RobTam

squeaky,

Thanks for the point. I offer one to you in response for promoting a genuine discussion.

For what it's worth, I abhor the way that what should be legitimate scientific debate is too often marred by political rhetoric and personal attack. I follow SOJO because I support Jim's efforts to seek justice for the poor and disenfranchised in the world, and to seek peace in keeping with the teachings of the Prince of Peace. But I happen to disagree on the significance of AGW, and the policy prescriptions that are currently being debated in Copenhagen. I believe that they will ultimately do more harm than good.

As for your comments, I raise the issue of 1000 climatologists because there is no one who can provide "proof" that the current warming is primarily due to CO2. This is a function of the scientific process, because to actually prove it, you would need to create a functionally equivalent physical model of the earth and conduct an experiment on it by a controlled increase in CO2. Computer models can never substitute for a physical model, and the results of the modeling cannot be used to "prove" anything. At best, computer model results are just more data that need to be verified by the scientific method.

When I talk about empirical evidence, I mean actual measured results that show that in a complex, coupled, non-linear system like the earth's atmosphere, that when you add a greenhouse gas such as CO2, the radiative forcing increases significantly accordingly, which eventually, left unchecked, results in runaway global warming. The closest that we have to such evidence is the Vostok ice cores that Al Gore made famous in AIT. I won't repeat in detail what I already described in Day 6, but what that ice core record shows is that CO2 follows temperature (contrary to what Mr. Gore implies), and that this demonstrates that CO2 forcing is quite weak (see Day 6 for my detailed explanation).

So, I don't deny that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. But what I am saying is that the available evidence suggests that it is a weak climate forcing whose strength is apparently strongly attenuated by negative rather than positive climatic feedbacks.

RobTam

Steve McIntyre definitely has a significant axe to grind. But it is not a political ax. In fact, he studiously and steadfastly prohibits any discussion of politics or policy on his blog. If you so much as hint at an issue of policy, you are snipped so fast that your nose will bleed. Right now, the word 'Copenhagen' is effectively banned.

Steve's ax is about the transparency and the integrity of the scientific process that currently underlies the body of climate change understanding. He has been pressing for years for full disclosure of data and methods to allow independent third party verification of the conclusions of climate science that are promulgated by the IPCC and their advocates. For years he has repeatedly been refused access to so much of the data that forms the current "consensus". Only once you realize the efforts that he has put in, do you begin to understand the significance of the Climategate letters.

Most of the recent posts are pretty non-technical, since much discussion has been about Climategate issues. However, if you browse through the archives a bit, you'll understand what I mean by sophisticated mathematics and statistics.

And for what it's worth, Steve has let down his political guard on a few occasions. Though Canadian, he describes himself as a Bill Clinton Democrat. And on the day after Obama was elected, he suspended normal blog policy and wrote an entry suggesting that this was a good thing for the US and the world. Granted, most of his readers didn't quite see it the same way.

squeaky

By the way, I gave you a point, not because I agree with you, but because I would like to commend you for the respectful tone of your posts. I haven't read everything you have written on this site, but what I have read is in stark contrast to others here who call into question the findings of climate science. From you, I haven't seen the name-calling, disrespectful scoffing that characterizes so many. Thank you for keeping it respectful and intelligent.