News
* By Connie Wardle
Two phoenix sculptures hung suspended from the ceiling, their bodies dotted with lights and their tail feathers unfurling above the heads of the faith leaders and adherents who gathered in the Cathedral of St John the Divine for an interfaith service on 21 September in New York.
The service concluded a day marked by calls for action on climate change. At an interfaith summit, hosted by the World Council of Churches (WCC) and Religions for Peace, faith leaders from 21 countries signed a statement urging the world’s political and economic leaders to work toward an agreement to curb global carbon emissions and to support those who are most vulnerable to the effects of a changing climate. And in the streets of New York, hundreds of thousands of people marched in a collective call for action on climate change.
Their voices echoing in the cathedral, leaders, elders and activists from many faiths including indigenous, Christian, Buddhist, Jewish, Muslim and Hindu religious confessions spoke from their own perspectives and faith traditions. They called for humanity to come together, to heal the planet Earth and fight against the common enemy of climate change, and for each person to make a commitment—symbolized by pieces of stone left by each person on a central table—to do something specific to address the ways they contribute to climate change. Many of the speakers called for hope.
“I was told by my elders to show this gathering there is hope for mankind,” said Angaangaq Angakkorsuaq, an Eskimo-Kalaallit elder from Greenland. But hope, he said, can come only from “melting the heart of ice in man. Now is the time for change.”
“This is our moment. This is our time,” shouted Rev. Dr Gerald Durley, pastor emeritus of Providence Missionary Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia, to a chorus of cheers and a standing ovation. “We will not be silent. We will speak boldly and we will not stand down.”
“We have a duty to be watchful, not just by opening our eyes but by opening our hearts,” said former US vice-president and Nobel peace laureate Al Gore. “It is time to be wakeful and to be alert. That is my pledge. To be wakeful, to be alert and to call on others to do the same.”
The service ended beneath the wings of fabric birds which floated through the air on the ends of wooden sticks, as the gathering sang a South African hymn. It was an appropriate choice for the end of a climate march: Siyahamba or We Are Marching in the Light of God.
*Connie Wardle is a senior writer and online editor at the Presbyterian Record, Canada.
Interfaith declaration on climate change (WCC news release of 22 September 2014)
