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WALK A LITTLE LIGHTER

John Madeley* considers climate change from a Christian perspective.

Is God green? Yes! A thousand times yes!  God created a beautiful world. 'God saw all that he had made and it was very good,' says the book of Genesis. God created something good and expects us to care for it. We have a responsibility to be good stewards of creation.

God loves us, all of us as individuals. God is love. He cannot fail to love what He created. Christians believe that God came to Earth as a man. When Jesus walked this Earth he taught in parables drawn from nature. He reminded people that seemingly insignificant elements of the natural world are of supreme value to God.

For Christians, creation is a gift - God's gift to us, but a gift to be cared for, enjoyed and shared with others. Imagine someone giving you a gift and you trash it . . . unthinkable. But this is what human beings are doing. Instead of stewards we have become rapists. What is happening is anything but 'very good'.

This is clear from the work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. In 1990 the panel, consisting of  2,500 scientists from 130 countries, issued its first report. This warned that if emissions of greenhouse gases continue to grow as projected, then average temperatures 'will increase by two to four degrees Celsius in the next century'. A rise over two degrees Celsius is considered by scientists to be dangerous. At the end of January this year the panel issued its latest report. And the rise in temperature it now predicts is in the range of four to 6.4 degrees Celsius by the end of the century - an alarming rise in just 17 years.

This report leaves little room for doubt that human activity is to blame. Carbon emissions which cause climate change come from our use of energy - in our homes, vehicles, factories, offices, public buildings and so on.

What would a rise of four degrees Celsius mean? Loss of food production and more droughts; African crops will slump by 15-35 percent; and millions of poor farmers will be made especially vulnerable. Ice will begin to melt. Half the Arctic is at risk and the Greenland ice sheet will start to melt. Europe will lose 80 percent of its alpine glaciers. The west Antarctic ice sheet will begin to melt. And sea levels will rise by up to 59 centimetres.  Flooding will increase with Bangladesh and Vietnam being worst hit. Disease will increase, with more people dying of malaria. The availability of fresh water will be halved in southern Africa and the Mediterranean.  Hurricanes will become more powerful, with wind strengths increasing 15-25 percent. Infrastructure will be damaged and rainfall will become fiercer and more erratic. In short, the poorest in our world - already sufferers - will suffer the most.

For Christians, the implications are enormous. Jesus came to bring good news to the poor. And yes, the church has mostly been slow to speak out about the implications. This is changing. In November 2006, at a rally on climate change in Trafalgar Square, James Jones, Bishop of Liverpool and also president of the aid agency Tearfund, said: 'I've been to Africa and India and seen the ruined harvests and the rice fields where children drowned in the floods. How can we claim to be helping Africa if through our own profligacy we wreck the climate and ruin their harvests? In Africa there's a saying that we have "borrowed the present from our children". But we have not borrowed the present - we have stolen it from them and we are stealing their future.  That is not just a crime against humanity; it is an offence to God.'  

'Thou shalt not steal,' states the eighth commandment. Yet we are stealing from the poor in the way we live. And we are stealing also from future generations, from our children and our grandchildren, for it is they who would have to bear the consequences of climate change. Do any of us relish explaining to them why we, in the early twenty-first century, did so little to stop the climate changing in a ruinous way? All of us, of whatever faith or belief, surely need to change the way we live.

What can we do? Seek a  way to reduce our carbon emissions. It is mainly through our transport and houses that we emit carbon. We can drive less, change to a smaller car or hybrid vehicle that uses less fuel. If we fly, we can take one less flight a year or stop flying altogether.

The Bishop of London, Richard Chartres, has said that there is now an overriding imperative, '. . . to walk more lightly upon the earth and we need to make our lifestyle decisions in that light. Making selfish choices such as flying on holiday or buying a large car are a symptom of sin. Sin is not just a restricted list of moral mistakes. It is living a life turned in on itself where people ignore the consequences of their actions.'

Cycling, walking, using public transport takes longer. But what is time for? For Christians, time is to find God, to love God, to serve God and our neighbour.

More of us are becoming aware of the need to switch off appliances, use low energy light bulbs and energy-efficient machines in our homes, and to warm ourselves rather than the air around us if we can. Churches too have a responsibility to examine whether they use energy in an efficient manner. Many churches have large roofs. Solar photovoltaic panels are an important option.

There is hope if we act, if all of us do what we can, as soon as we can. The IPCC panel stresses that the outcome - the damage - is not inevitable.  We must act to keep rises in temperature down to below two degrees Celsius. To achieve this greenhouse gas emissions must peak and be falling by 2015.

Jesus taught us to pray, in the prayer we know as the Lord's Prayer, 'Hallowed be thy name'. If we honour God's name, we honour what He created.

*John Madeley is a Lay Minister at St. Peter's Church, Caversham, and a writer on global issues. His latest book (with Miles Litvinoff) is 50 Reasons to Buy Fair Trade.