With pointed urgency, faiths rise for climate justice
Original petition published by the World Council of Churches & Greenfaith
The World Council of Churches (WCC) joined grassroots religious activists, high-level faith leaders that issued ten demands and condemned inadequate progress by governments and financial institutions.
17 March 2021
More than 400 grassroots religious actions in 43 countries, thousands of people of faith called on political and financial leaders to meet a series of ambitious climate demands at COP26. Held on 11 March, a multi-faith climate day of action was co-sponsored by over 120 religious groups.
Alarmed by the massive gap between what is required to limit global temperature rise and actual climate change commitments by governments and financial institutions, grassroots religious activists released a set of powerful demands for world leaders to address the injustice and impacts that the climate crisis is inflicting on communities worldwide.
The statement calls on governments and banks immediately to end their support for new fossil fuel infrastructure and tropical deforestation, to commit to universal access to clean and affordable energy, to enact policies creating green jobs and a just transition for impacted workers and communities, to secure policies and funding supporting those forced to migrate due to climate impacts, and more.
Members of the Greenfaith International Network noted that as the COVID-19 pandemic has cost millions of people their jobs and their health, the fossil fuel industry has secured billions of dollars of emergency bailout funding while lobbying to weaken climate and environmental protections. In addition, during the past year in Brazil, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Indonesia, home to the world’s largest tropical rainforests, governments have actually made it easier for agribusinesses to accelerate logging.
The full text of the statement and ten demands are available here