wfn.org | WCC NEWS: Climate change and the Pacific: "It is too late for our island, not for the world"

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World Council of Churches - News Release

Contact: +41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363 media@wcc-coe.org
For immediate release - 24/11/2008 12:20:21

CLIMATE CHANGE: IT IS TOO LATE TO SAVE OUR ISLAND, 
BUT NOT TOO LATE FOR THE WORLD, SAY PACIFIC CHRISTIANS

At the 16-21 November United Nations Advocacy Week of the World
Council of Churches (WCC) Christians from the Pacific islands
have appealed for worldwide solidarity with regard to climate
change, a question of life and death in their communities, 

Rev. Asora Amosa, a Samoan-born pastor of the Presbyterian
Church of Aotearoa New Zealand, spoke of the region's feeling of
threat: “If icebergs break off and float past the south coast
of New Zealand we wonder what is coming next.”

Addressing a diverse group of more than 100 representatives from
churches and organizations defending people and nature around the
world, Amosa underscored that it is time to take action together:
“We have criticized the industrialized nations for failing to
take courageous action, but we realize also that the time for
according blame has gone.” 

Rev. Baranite Kirata from Kiribati, one of the three Pacific
island states which will lose their territory to the rising sea
level in the foreseeable future, explained what it means to know
that not only will his people become refugees but that the place
they call home will disappear under the rising waters. 

“Myself, when I am travelling my heart always longs for home,
for where I can cry and rejoice with my people,” Kirata said. 

People in Kiribati already lose their homes and livelihoods as
floods have become more frequent and intense while fish become
fewer. Their health is threatened by diseases and extreme heat,
or as an elderly lady on one of the outer islands once told the
pastor: “The sun burns as if it was just above my head.”

The rising sea level leads to salt water killing the roots of
trees and polluting wells; at the same time, rainfall, the second
source of drinking water for the islanders, becomes scarce.

>Eaten by the waves

For the Pacific churches, the issue is not only political and
economic, but deeply theological, ethical and spiritual. They
feel that their place in God's creation is at stake. “The
storms and waves eat away our beaches and as they continue they
will some day eat us,” said Kirata. 

Those whose houses on the coast have been destroyed move further
inland. It is clear, however, that this is not a lasting
solution. “If we don't end up in the lagoon, we will end up
fighting each other over land, food, water.”

Fe'iloakitau Kaho Tevi, general secretary of the Pacific
Conference of Churches, said he already had received many
requests to help relocate places of worship from threatened
coastal areas to higher ground. 

Churches in the Pacific have developed action plans and
conservation activities. Pacific islanders also cooperate with
partners in the North in raising awareness. 

For example, recently a small boat full of “climate
refugees” including two Pacific islanders in traditional
attire floated on the River Spree in front of the German
parliament, giving visibility to the issue during a Stop Coal
Campaign supported by the agencies Bread for the World and EED of
the Evangelical Church in Germany.

The discussions at the event in New York underscored the
injustice that the populations who will be hardest hit by the
atmospheric changes are the ones who have hardly contributed to
them. While for example European countries have only few
low-lying, densely populated areas, the resources they have
available for the construction of seawalls exceed by far the
possibilities of island states like Kiribati.

Elias Crisostomo Abramides of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of
Buenos Aires and South America affirmed the WCC's role as the
voice for ethical and justice issues during international
negotiations on climate protection.

>Objectives of Church advocacy

Rev. Jorge Domingues, a Brazilian from the United Methodist
Church, called on Christians in the financial markets to adopt a
shareholder advocacy policy and press companies on climate change
agenda. He added that churches also need to consider the carbon
footprint of their own work.

Tevi, the general secretary of the Pacific Conference of
Churches, said a series of actions the churches should advocate
includes contributing to an adaptation fund based on the
“polluter pays” principle and calculating each country’s
greenhouse gas emissions and gross domestic product. 

Another action is the promotion of renewable energy, as opposed
to non-permanent solutions like carbon capture or nuclear power
of which the Pacific islanders have “bad memories”. Tevi also
called for research into the cultural, legal and economic
implications of a nation's sovereign territory disappearing. 

With a mixture of realism and optimism, Rev. Baranite Kirata
explained that “it is now too late to do something for
Kiribati, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands; but together, we are
the world, and it is not too late to do something for us all.”

>WCC campaign on climate change:
>http://www.oikoumene.org/?id=3416

>United Nations Advocacy Week of the WCC:
>http://unaw.oikoumene.org

>WCC member churches in the Pacific:
>http://www.oikoumene.org/?id=4544

Additional information:

Juan Michel +41 22 791 6153 +41 79 507 6363 media@wcc-coe.org

The World Council of Churches promotes Christian unity in faith,
witness and service for a just and peaceful world. An ecumenical
fellowship of churches founded in 1948, today the WCC brings
together 349 Protestant, Orthodox, Anglican and other churches
representing more than 560 million Christians in over 110
countries, and works cooperatively with the Roman Catholic
Church. The WCC general secretary is Rev. Dr Samuel Kobia, from
the Methodist Church in Kenya. Headquarters: Geneva, Switzerland.