{"id":49677,"date":"2017-11-14T18:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-11-14T18:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/new\/faith-representatives-meet-pacific-climate-warriors\/"},"modified":"2017-11-16T20:21:21","modified_gmt":"2017-11-16T20:21:21","slug":"faith-representatives-meet-pacific-climate-warriors","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/faith-representatives-meet-pacific-climate-warriors\/","title":{"rendered":"Faith representatives meet Pacific Climate Warriors"},"content":{"rendered":"\"\"\n

Representatives from diverse faith groups gathered with Pacific Climate Warriors at the People\u2019s Climate Summit <\/a>to discuss how the principles of justice at the heart of many religions can guide us and provide hope in the face of climate change.<\/p>\n

The Warriors reflected on Sunday\u2019s powerful events \u2013 the symbolic rain during the sevusevu ceremony inviting the spirit and presence of ancestors, and the thousands of activists who entered the mine with Ende Gel\u00e4nde as a kind of resurrection<\/a>, bringing life back into Germany\u2019s bleak dead coal mines.<\/p>\n

Lusia Taloafulu Feagaiga, a Pacific Climate Warrior and youth leader in the Methodist church of New Zealand, shared on the importance of engaging people of faith in order to build a climate movement in the Pacific, giving the example of the \u201cPray for Our Pacific\u201d campaign<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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People of different faiths from all over the world gathering @PCSBonn<\/a> to discuss faith and its power in the climate movement pic.twitter.com\/I6MpM6m2qD<\/a><\/p>\n

\u2014 350.org Europe (@350Europe) November 7, 2017<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

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\u201cWhat is hard for us to hear, is when the media refers to the impacts of climate change in the future, as if it was something that is not already a reality\u201d, says Lusia. Nodding sadly, the other Warriors expressed their surprise that during their visit to Germany for the climate summit, they had been asked repeatedly to explain what climate change will mean for the Pacific. \u201cWe had this discussion ten years ago. Now the devastation is happening, we talk about what we can do\u201d.<\/p>\n

Religious leaders called on faith communities to take concrete action against the fossil fuel industry through divestment<\/strong>, as a way to \u201cput the money where our mouth is.\u201d Since the Church of Sweden became the first church group to divest from oil and coal in 2008, more than two hundred other religious institutions have followed.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs religious leaders, we have a special way of dealing with issues of addiction \u2013 and oil is an addiction for our societies<\/strong>. So we can help.\u201d said Imam Saffet Catovic, Co-founder of Green Muslims of New Jersey and GreenFaith Senior Advisor.<\/p>\n

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Speakers, left to right: Reverend Fletcher Harper, Imam Saffet Catovic, Rapha Breyer of BDKJ<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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Reverend Fletcher Harper of Green Faith shared advice on how to start the conversation on divestment with faith communities: \u201cIf you want to start a moral discussion, don\u2019t say \u2018let\u2019s have a moral discussion\u2019 \u2013 talk about money. That\u2019s where values really come to play.\u201d<\/p>\n

He argued that church institutions have an opportunity to show leadership, as was the case on October 4, 2017, when 40 Catholic institutions across five continents committed to divest in the largest joint announcement to date. Daniela Finnamore from Global Catholic Climate Movement spoke about this recent win and encouraged German faith institutions to follow suit.<\/p>\n

Yet, religious values can provide valuable guidance beyond questions of financial responsibility. \u201cAs people of faith, we need to think about how we can challenge the unjust system we have and create an entirely better one.\u201d Participants discussed the question of direct action and civil disobedience, asking whether the urgency of climate change might require us to break the rules.<\/p>\n

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Nora Keske, a German activist and representative of the Liberation Theology Network, quoted German poet Bertolt Brecht: \u201cWhen injustice becomes law, resistance becomes our duty. Faith can guide us in this fight. It gives me hope.\u201d<\/p>\n

The session ended with a moment of silence called for by a Buddhist participant, to \u201creflect on what we have achieved together\u201d. To foster the connection between the participants from all over the world, the Pacific Climate Warriors distributed Sei flowers, which represent the joyful and resilient spirits of Pacific Islanders.<\/p>\n

Many people from faith institutions have joined the Pacific Climate Warriors in their call to end the fossil fuel era and sign the Declaration<\/a> on Climate Change as part of the #HaveYourSei campaign. They delivered these demands to Pacific leaders at COP23 on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

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Representatives from diverse faith groups gathered with Pacific Climate Warriors at the People\u2019s Climate Summit to discuss how the principles…<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":49678,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[4],"class_list":["post-49677","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-cop23","tag-crossposted"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49677","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=49677"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/49677\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/49678"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=49677"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=49677"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/gofossilfree.org\/indonesia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=49677"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}