The Role of Faith-Based Groups in the Fight Against Climate Change
By Jonathan Birchall
What should be the role of faith-based groups be in the fight for what’s called Climate Justice--ensuring that the burden of our climate emergency do not fall most heavily on the countries, communities and people who had the least to do with the industrialization that created the climate crisis in the first place?
I’ve known since our Congregation called Reverend Peggy as our Senior Minister back in 2019 that this is an issue she is deeply engaged in—from attending the COP Meeting in Glasgow in 2022, to taking part in protests actions from Standing Rock to Washington DC. And I know Rev Peggy has worked in the past with GreenFaith, a non-profit group which for 15 years has organized and coordinated action and advocacy by faith groups on climate issues (including, for example, last year’s interfaith rally and participation in the Climate March ahead of last year’s UN General Assembly, or this year’s protests at Citigroup over fossil fuel financing).
So I felt particularly fortunate to be able to meet up in mid-August with Fletcher Harper, the executive director and founder of GreenFaith, and with Meryne Warah, the Nairobi-based Global Director for Organizing, who has been visiting New York. I knew that GreenFaith works with congregations across the United States; I didn’t know that the group has an international presence too—with a rapidly developing network that highlights and centers the voices of front-line, grass roots climate justice advocates.
Meryne, who was in town with her young son, shared some interesting insights over a breakfast meeting on Park Avenue about her work with religious groups in Kenya, Uganda, and Tanzania. In Kenya, for instance, she explained that religious leaders can wield significant political influence, albeit not always in support of progressive causes; about 80% of the population identify as Christian (about 20% are Roman Catholics, and some 30% are Pentecostals), while about 11% are Muslim.
Before joining GreenFaith, Meryne had worked on climate organizing and advocacy for the Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance and before that with the Inter-Religious Council of Kenya—giving her close up experience of the challenges and opportunities of developing grass roots engagement on climate issues that can be connected to top level policy advocacy with governments and policy makers.
“It’s at the grass roots that people experience the problems being caused by climate change—when they can’t get water for their crops because of desertification, or when they can’t fish because fish stocks are being affected by climate disruption. Part of what we do is to help local faith leaders understand how they can share these issues across communities, and push to secure the support that these communities need.”
Some of GreenFaith’s highest profile action has focused around opposing plans for the East Africa Crude Oil Pipeline (EACOP), a 900 mile planned oil pipeline designed to carry oil from newly developed Lake Albert oil fields in northern Uganda to the Tanzanian port of Tanga on the Indian Ocean coast. This project would displace more than 80,000 people—mostly small farmers—while generating massive carbon emissions and speading toxic contamination along the pipeline route. GreenFaith’s work included publishing a report in November last year documenting ways that the pipeline consortium, which is led by France’s Total and China’s China National Oil Company, has damaged and destroyed sacred sites and traditional graves along the route of the pipeline. Earlier this year, Green Faith has also rallied religious leaders from across the Green Faith network to speak out against the intimidation of local critics of the pipeline project in Tanzania.
“In East Africa, local religious groups and leaders are held in high regard by political leaders; that can give them a level of protection when it comes to more speaking out, even more than say a local human rights monitoring group. But bringing in international voices too can add some further support and protection,” she says.
Meryne noted that part of her work at GreenFaith in making these connections has involved communicating across different political cultures when considering the best way for local communities and their religious leaders to speak out.
Religious leaders in the United States or Europe may be happy to be arrested during protests as an act of civil disobedience that rarely leads to anything worse than a short spell in police detention or a fine. But being arrested by the police in Kenya, Tanzania or Uganda is another matter entirely—as demonstrated by the abductions and kidnappings of individuals in Kenya who were involved in protests that broke out across Kenya in late June, along with a shocking wave of police violence left more than 80 people dead.
For Meryne and Fletcher, groups in the United States like our own Community Church of New York form a vital part of this effort to build a grass-roots led movement for climate justice—complementing the ongoing effort to expand the network not only in Africa but in Latin America and in Southeast Asia.
In Fletcher’s words: “The GreenFaith community can bring international voices to support to grass roots activists in their local struggles. We can bring local voices and issues to corporate headquarters in New York, or to political leaders at the United Nations, or in Washington DC. And in doing this, we can make sure that progressive religion has a voice in the vital global struggle for Climate Justice.”
