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February 27, 2008
U.S. faith leaders share global warming views with Irish counterparts
Members of the U.S. faith delegation on global warming with the Rev. Ian Paisley (center) and Martin McGuinness (right), the leaders of Northern Ireland’s new governing assembly. Photo courtesy of Renee Rico BELFAST, Northern Ireland — Four faith leaders from Protestant, Catholic and Jewish organizations in the United States met here with a wide variety of stakeholders, including top politicians and church leaders as part of a trip to share the U.S. faith experience in responding to the issue of climate change.
The four included Cassandra Carmichael, eco-justice program director for the National Council of Churches USA., Dan Misleh of the Catholic Coalition on Climate Change, Liore Milgrom-Elcott with Coalition on Jewish Life and the Environment (COEJL), and the Rev. Renee Rico with Presbyterians for Restoring Creation (PRC).
As Northern Ireland recovers from the violence of sectarian terror by Protestant and Catholic paramilitaries that engulfed the country for more than twenty years, the exchange, funded by British Consulate General, New York, offered both sides some learning opportunities.
“We met with people who are dealing with exhaustion in the aftermath of tragedy, but we also met with leaders who have the vision of hope for a new day,” said Misleh. “I hope that we offered a hopeful model for the churches in Northern Ireland to work together on this vital issue.”
“Because global climate change will effect us all, and those in poverty the most, it transcends religious and political divides and provides vibrant opportunities for faith communities to come together to address this global concern,” said Carmichael. “What we have seen here in the UK is that the Christian aid agencies have taken on the issue of climate change and its affect on the poor of the world with the general public.”
“I’ve been surprised to see the large billboards all over the United Kingdom that connect poverty and climate change,” said the Rev. Renee Rico, PRC’s national coordinator. “Unfortunately, that hasn’t yet translated widely down to the pastor and congregational levels, although some good work is being done on a limited level.”
Members of the U.S. faith delegation on global warming met with Ronnie Millar (right), director of Corymeela, the PC(USA)-backed study center for peace and reconciliation in Northern Ireland. Photo courtesy of Renee Rico Religious leaders in Northern Ireland admit that there is not yet a working strategy within their denominations for responding on this issue, although the groundwork is being slowly laid with conferences for clergy and laypeople.
Part of the challenge lies with an educational system for clergy that does not include ethics courses at the seminary level, according to the Rev. Bill Shaw, a Protestant who serves as executive director of the 174 Trust, a community-based center that seeks to work on reconciliation in some of the most conflicted neighborhoods in North Belfast.
Shaw’s own transformation occurred because of his experience in living among Catholics in one of his parishes. Now, he says, the challenge is to work with the generations coming of age who feel the need to “protect their neighborhood” even though the violence has abated.
Another facet of the challenge is the fledgling government in Northern Ireland. The Northern Ireland Assembly only began meeting last May, and many of the members and leaders in the Assembly are learning their roles and responsibilities for governing and the art of compromise in public life.
The delegation met briefly with the Northern Ireland Assembly’s First Minister, Ian Paisley — a Free Presbyterian minister — and the Deputy First Minister, Martin McGuinness, a member of Sinn Fein, the chief Catholic political party.
They also met with members of minority parties in the Assembly, including the sole Green Party member, who advocates stronger action on climate change.
Another piece of the puzzle is that some clergy are exhausted from their long-term efforts to cap the violence in Northern Ireland. They are in need a “Sabbath” time, many said, before moving ahead on an issue as challenging as climate change.
Northern Ireland is delicately nudging towards dealing with the past violence in ways that will provide a way to rebuild its communities, Rico said. Some fear that such discussions might provoke a return to violence.
“How a people can move fully beyond the terror of the “Troubles” and into a place of cross-community environmental efforts will not be easy,” says COEJL’s Milgrom-Elcott.
“Nonetheless, neither the memory of terror nor the issues of climate change will simply disappear. Both require great effort and compromise,” he said. “I hope that we, the delegates, enabled new conversations and connections and empowered the current efforts of the grassroots movement.”
Seeds of hope are being planted. The delegation met with environmental groups and faith leaders and remarked that, unlike in the U.S., there is no strong cultural gap between environmentalists and those who are part of faith communities.
“We don’t see that in the U.S. very often, where often churches defend the poor, while the environmentalists defend nature,’ says Rico. “This is a plus that we don’t have in the United States at the moment.”
Further coordinating efforts across the Atlantic are being considered for the future. Corrymeela, a Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)-supported center that has worked for peace and reconciliation, is in conversations with PRC about an internship focused on reducing its “carbon footprint,” which Director Ronnie Millar freely admits was one of the worst ever seen by consultants who evaluated the center’s environmental practices.
"We hope that our presence here in Northern Ireland can be a catalyst for increased dialogue and cooperation not only within the faith community but the throughout the wider community,” said Rico.
Information for this story furnished by the Rev. Renee Rico. |
