News

“Like Father like daughter”, Rev Mpho Tutu  was the key note speaker at the Launch of the Fossil Free South Africa campaign in Cape Town. She reminded us of the sanctions against South Africa which were one of the most crucial issues that brought the apartheid government to the bargaining table. To bring down apartheid seemed impossible – but “it is only the impossible which is worth doing” Those who emit the most carbon are the most cushioned from the effects of climate change. The search for fossil fuels leads to an  increase in  violence and wars, climate change is increasing the  refugee crisis as people are forced off their land. We have clean energy alternatives, but we don’t explore them because of the dominance of the fossil fuel industries. “We are stealing from the generations yet to come” The South African divestment campaign was launched at the University of Cape Town in 2013 and is building up traction. David le Page one of the founders said that there are currently roughly $28 trillion worth of fossil fuel reserves in the world. We can only burn $6 trillion of them if we are stay in safe limits of carbon emissions. That means that $22 trillion of fossil fuels are unburnable The concept of divestment is to remove reserves and savings from fossil fuel companies and to invest them with more ethical portfolios. The challenge in South Africa is that there are currently no such ethical portfolios as exist in other countries. Divestment campaigns have been very successful with USA universities, and the Anglican Church in New Zealand has agreed to divest.  In the last two years since the divestment campaign started globally,  $50 billion has been shifted from fossil fuels to other investments. This is a serious amount of money , when we realize that the UN Green Fund has only raised $2billion to date. Let the coal stay in the hole and the oil stay in the soil!! You can find out more about the campaign on http://gofossilfreesouthafrica.wordpress.com/

The first ”Wetlands Church” took place in Cape Town in the beautiful Glencairn Valley. Led by Fr Bob Commin  we walked a poetic spiritual journey from the sea through the wetlands.  We started with a prayer on the beach watching the waves and hearing the wind, sensing the presence of the Holy Spirit “ I am the wind that breathes upon the sea”. We looked up at the grandeur of the mountains and gave thanks for God’s greatness but also recognized the damage done by human beings: “generations have trod, have trod, have trod,and all is smeared with trade”. Then we spent some time alone in the silence to let God speak to us through creation. “Forest Church” has been planted in Cape Town and we are excited to see where God will take us! Next year we will have monthly reflective, interactive, meditative services at “River church”, “Vlei church” , “Mountain church” and many more as we learn to hear from God in Creation. We often forget that God speaks through the written word and also through creation. Romans 1:20 reminds us that “There are things about God that people cannot see—his eternal power and all that makes him God. But since the beginning of the world, those things have been easy for people to understand. They are made clear in what God has made.” Psalms 19:1-14 also reminds us that “The heavens declare the glory of God;     the skies proclaim the work of his hands. 2 Day after day they pour forth speech;     night after night they reveal knowledge. 3 They have no speech, they use no words;     no sound is heard from them. 4 Yet their voice goes out into all the earth,     their words to the ends of the world. Psalm 19:1-4

  Bishop Paul Sarker is the Moderator of the Church of Bangladesh which was formed after the independence of Bangladesh, it is a united church comprising the Anglican, Presybterian and other churches. He sees the Church’s social development programme as a natural extension of the Church. Once when I was young priest, the Bishop sent me to a place where there was a big flood. The people there were suffering; they didn’t have seeds to produce crops and things like that. So I was doing some survey work and they asked where I was from. I said I was from the Church. So they said “ok then you can do something for us, but many others have come, one after one, they told us this and that, but they never came back.” They knew the Church would come back.    One area of work close to his heart is the Church of Bangladesh Social Development Programme.. They work on education and health and now increasingly on cyclone relief and disaster management. Bangladesh is one of the countries most threatened by sea level rise, as it is in one of the most unprotected countries. So climate change will have a direct impact on the people of  the Church of Bangladesh and their communities. The  Social Development Program has created a publication, written by James Pender, entitled “Climate Change, Its Impacts and Possible Community Based Responses in Bangladesh” with the goal of building climate resistant communities in order to reduce the loss of life and livelihood and problems caused by climate change. The program is working to improve disaster management and food security, increase tree planting, and develop better irrigation including a new method of crop irrigation in saline water. They have identified the training of clergy, lay leaders, staff and group members as integral to development. They recognize that it is also important to raise awareness and mobilization to protect the natural resources and gain control of consuming excess electricity, water and other detrimental habits. The main threats faced by the Church are  risks of flooding, as sea level rises with the more persistent and stronger storms seen today. Increasing  the salinity of soil and drinking water, the tidal surges deposit salt water inundating  inland- resulting in crops not growing and a lack of drinking water through most of the year. Damaging flooding is also seen during the rainy season, heavy rainfall caused by the flooding of Himalayan rivers filled with sand and silt. These floods wash away human habitation, crop fields and markets. Droughts are caused in the Northwest because of the extremes of heat. Bangladesh is under serious threat from climate change. Bishop Sarker will be joining  a group of Eco-bishops under the leadership of Archbishop Thabo Makgoba to discuss how the Anglican Communion can take up the challenge of climate change. Willie Lutes (quotes from http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu/interviews/a-discussion-with-bishop-paul-sarker-moderator-church-of-bangladesh-bishop-of-dhaka)