Photo: Kmtextor
Churches in the UK are being asked to urgently divest from fossil fuels in response to the climate emergency in a new report from Operation Noah, the Christian climate change charity.
Church investments in major oil companies: Paris compliant or Paris defiant? is backed by Rt Revd Dr Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury and Chair of Christian Aid, who commented:
‘The current health crisis has highlighted as never before the need for coherent international action in the face of global threat. Can we learn the lesson and apply it to the global threat of climate change? To do so means taking practical and effective steps to reduce our lethal dependence on fossil fuels, and this report challenges the churches to take these steps as a matter of urgency.’
The report shows the gap between the business plans of major oil companies and the Paris Agreement targets, which commits to limit global average temperature increases to well below 2°C compared with pre-industrial levels, and aims for 1.5°C.
Operation Noah says that several UK churches have already completed the process of divestment from fossil fuels, including Quakers in Britain, the Church of Ireland and the United Reformed Church.
Two Catholic dioceses in England and Wales have so far divested from fossil fuels, and the report calls on the remaining dioceses to join them – and 150 other Catholic institutions around the world – in making divestment commitments.
In other denominations, such as the Church of Scotland, the Church in Wales and the Scottish Episcopal Church, Church bodies have made divestment recommendations.
The 2017 Methodist Conference and the Church of England General Synod in July 2018 also both voted for specific divestment motions.
The report argues that all these denominations should start divesting now.
You can download the report and an executive summary from the BrightNow website.
