The Bishop of Norwich is today (Wednesday July 9) taking part in a mass climate lobby of Parliament.
The lobby is bringing together thousands of people from all over the country to ask MPs to take action to help those facing climate disaster.
The Rt Revd Graham Usher, who is a member of the House of Lords and the Church of England’s lead bishop for the environment, said: “As a Christian I believe that caring for the climate is important because it honours God’s call to look after the earth and to love our neighbours, including those on the front line of the severe impact of climate change, as well as the rest of creation also crying out.
“Standing alongside people of different faiths at the mass lobby will emphasise that together we share a common concern and seek the common good because climate change impacts all areas of life – food production, the natural environment, health, community resilience, migration, conflict and war. It is making the world less stable. My prayer is that politicians, indeed all of us, will truly wake up to the urgency of the threat and take the urgent action needed on our carbon emissions. This is not an optional extra for the ministry of the Church, it is an imperative for the mission of God’s Church.”
Bishop Graham joined Kamran Shezad, Director for the Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Sciences and Jonathan Wittenberg, Senior Rabbi of the New North London Synagogue and Founder of EcoJudaism, to co-write an article for the Church Times calling for fair funding to tackle the consequences of climate breakdown.
They pointed out the global iniquity that those who are most affected by climate breakdown have often done the least to create it and said: “As children of Abraham, each of our faiths share a common calling to care for the earth, to walk humbly and responsibly, and to treat others with fairness and kindness. The injustices of the climate crisis show starkly how our industrialised societies have failed to live up to these values. Each of us, inspired by our respective faiths, is compelled to speak out with a prophetic voice to change things so that together we may create a more loving and fairer world.
This is why faith communities have joined together to advocate for loss and damage funding.”
They called for politicians to look beyond national borders saying: “At a time when national interests increasingly take precedence, we need moral, spiritual and ethical leadership that calls us to look beyond borders; to stand in solidarity with those most vulnerable to climate impacts, wherever they are in the world, and not diminish our support for them.”
Looking ahead to the meeting of world leaders in Brazil in November for COP30, British faith groups are urging the government to help ensure those responsible for climate breakdown pay a fair share into the international loss and damage fund.
“It’s not enough to simply believe that a better world is possible. We must live out that belief in our actions, by joining together with others and speaking out where our voice can have an impact,” they said.