Christian organizations worldwide no longer sit on the sidelines during climate change discussions. Rather, they actively engage in talks and global warming campaigns.
Faith-based activists are among 10,000 participants at the biggest-ever climate change conference which opened Monday in Bali, Indonesia, according to The Associated Press.
Delegates, governments and journalists from nearly 190 countries gathered on the resort island for two weeks of U.N.-led talks with hopes of initiating negotiations on a deal to replace the Kyoto Protocol on global warming. The protocol expires at the end of 2012 and requires signatories to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change by an average 5 percent below 1990 levels.
Among the early signs of hope at the conference was Australia’s pledge on Monday to ratify the 1997 Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
U.K.-based Tearfund, a Christian humanitarian and development charity, joined other climate change activists in applauding Australia and its new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for the bold move.
Ben Thurley, Advocacy Co-ordinator for TEAR Australia, said in a statement he was “thrilled that the first act of our new Prime Minister was action on Kyoto.”
“I hope it signals a new era in climate change negotiations and that Australia will now take more of a lead in the right direction,” he added.
Human rights group Christian Aid U.K., currently attending the Bali conference, also applauded Australia’s pledge to join the Kyoto Protocol.
Australia’s decision to join leaves the United States as the only developed nation that has not signed the pact.
The Kyoto Protocol was signed by over 150 countries and called for reduction in emissions of greenhouse gases in absolute terms, but only by developing nations.
Besides a new framework to succeed the protocol, another key goal at the conference is to draw the United States, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, into the process.
Washington resisted from ratifying the Kyoto Protocol, arguing that mandatory cuts in emission would harm the economy and questioning the accuracy of global warming science.
Yet after a recent landmark report by the Nobel Peace-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the Bush administration has signaled its willingness to be more active in negotiations. The IPCC concluded that global warming is “unequivocal” and the world will suffer catastrophic natural disasters if the international community fails to respond.
Among the most contentious issue for a new framework is whether emission cuts should be mandatory or voluntary, which the United States favors.
Although the U.S. government continues to waver on mandatory emission reductions, many leading American evangelicals and Christian organizations are calling for emission cuts.
Signers of the Evangelical Climate Initiative (ECI) – which includes Rick Warren, author of the The Purpose Driven Life; Leith Anderson, senior pastor of Wooddale Church in St. Paul, Minn. and president of the National Association of Evangelicals; and Bill Hybels of Willow Creek Community Church near Chicago – are among over 100 evangelical leaders who agree that global warming is real and mainly caused by human activities.
ECI signers call for the federal government to pass and implement national legislation requiring economy-wide reductions in carbon dioxide emissions.
“Love of God, love of neighbor, and the demands of stewardship are more than enough reason for evangelical Christians to respond to the climate change problem with moral passion and concrete action,” the ECI statement reads.
A recent poll by Ellison Research found that 84 percent of evangelicals support legislation to reduce global warming pollution levels. The poll also found that 54 percent of evangelicals are more likely to support a candidate that works on the issue.
The United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali will conclude next week on Dec. 14.
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Well, we do know there are naturally occurring cycles, though you don't seem to hear a whole lot about them. I remember in the mid 70's there were dire predictions about entering an ice age, even predicted that by the turn of the century (isn't that passed?!!!) we'd be in serious trouble with famines, etc. etc.
Now it's global warming, blamed specifically on carbon dioxide levels as the culprit. But yeah, man's contribution is tiny, the ocean is a huge determiner of carbon dioxide, along with some other factors like the volcanos.
Read an article here recently that said now some Russian scientists are warning that we may be cycling towards another ice age type situation before long - wish I could remember where I got that. Gets rather hard to keep up with the "sky is falling" arguments.
There's some interesting arguments that state if we were really seeing global warming we should be seeing less storms instead of more, as it's frigid air meeting warm air that is the culprit, and in global warming we'd have more warm air to warm air situations resulting in LESS of those storms. Also, that all these plans to make all these fantastic changes to impact the temperature changes would only result in decreases of from .03 to around 1 degree in temperature, and these estimates include calculations from both sides of the issue. So, do we spend literally trillions of dollars for no real appreciable difference in temperature?
"so global warming is a scapegoat for natural cycles?"
Not for natural cycles, no. It does seem to be a catch-all excuse for variations we see in climate patterns.
maranatha,
so global warming is a scapegoat for natural cycles?
For example, I have friends in the South who are being adversely affected by severe drought. Their meteorologists are blaming this on "global warming", which has become the redheaded step-child of all climate "aliments" these days. Yet, is that accurate? That's what I mean. I think even scientists are just using global warming as a handy catch-all to explain (or explain away, depending on one's POV) climate and other changes.
HyperionOverseer, I was referring top any event in nature not caused by man which affects our climate. I think this side of the picture is being almost, if not entirely, overlooked.
Maranatha
are you referring to volcanic related forces?
in that case, it is more understandable,
the question i have is this
SINCE WHEN DOES 4% MEAN ANYTHING?(in terms of the amount of CO2 is man made)
dont we get like 10 to 20% from volcanoes?
The one thing we seem to hear little about is that no one has taken into account how much of the climate change we've seen over the last few decades has been due to forces of nature, not caused by man.