Interfaith Advocacy and the Environment

People of faith are alert to the moral and religious dimensions of a wide range of public policy issues, including environmental protection and restoration. In a religiously pluralistic society such as ours, the fact that members of different religious communities share common concerns and can speak to those concerns with one voice can be arresting and persuasive.

Without compromising their independence or the integrity and authenticity of their own particular traditions and communities, people of diverse faiths have joined together in networks and organizations to make their voice heard on behalf of those who promote justice and care for creation. Among these groups are:

• The Interfaith Climate Change Network is a collaborative effort between the Coalition on the Environment and Jewish Life and the National Council of Churches to pursue justice for the poor and the protection of creation by action to address global climate change. The ICCN maintains an electronic network for climate advocacy and works with several State Interfaith Climate Campaigns.
• The Religious Campaign for Forest Conservation is a coalition of churches, synagogues and para-religious organizations joined by a common concern for forest conservation and wilderness as religious issues.
  

An ambitious environmental justice initiative by this ecumenical group reflects its vision of advocacy as "spirit in action."

• The Interfaith Center for Corporate Responsibility and its members — 275 faith-based institutional investors — press companies to be socially and environmentally responsible, sponsoring shareholder resolutions on major social and environmental issues, including Environmental Justice, Global Warming, and Water and Food.
• Faith in Motion (Grand Rapids area) and MOSES – Metropolitan Organizing Strategy Enabling Strength (Detroit area) are two Michigan interfaith organizations that promote transportation policies that are economically and environmentally sound.
• Religious Witness for the Earth has organized statements by religious leaders and public witness events – including nonviolent civil disobedience — for climate change action, fuel efficiency, and protection of the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge.
• A Religious Agenda on Poverty and Global Climate Change Download Climate Fairness Agenda, a policy framework that begins with a series of goals for achieving environmental and economic fairness in the climate change legislation Congress is considering — and then identifies a set of ideas specifically designed to advance them domestically and internationally. (To download a PDF version, click here.)
• Statement of Senior Religious Leaders on global climate change and poverty. (To download a PDF version, click here.)