Trump’s appointees don’t seem to be signing required ethics pledges and don’t plan
to http://www.dailykos.com/story/2017/1/26/1625454/-Trump-s-appointees-don-t-seem-to-be-signing-required-ethics-pledges-and-don-t-plan-to By Walter Einenkel
A review of agreements between Trump’s top appointees and federal ethics regulators shows that none of the compacts mentions the 2009 executive order that requires incoming officials to sign a pledge to avoid participating in policies that “directly and substantially relate to [their] former employer or former clients” for the first two years of government service. Obama-era ethics agreements included standard language obligating political appointees to follow the rule.
If the ethics pledge rule is not enforced, watchdog groups say, Trump officials entering the administration from the private sector could quickly be in a position to use their government positions to enrich their former paymasters. Rather than facing a full two-year restriction as required by the Obama-era executive order, they would encounter only the one-year restriction previously enshrined in federal law.
Don’t you fear, we still may have one year before the most obvious conflict of interest gets a press op.
During their first year in government, presidential appointees face a federal law mandating a “cooling off” period that prohibits them from overseeing policy that affects their former employers. Another federal law creates a special two-year cooling off period if those former employers gave them an “extraordinary payment” upon their acceptance of a government job. While Energy Secretary designate Rick Perry and Commerce Secretary designate Wilbur Ross appear to be following that two-year restriction, Tillerson in his ethics agreement said he would avoid Exxon-related government business for only single year, despite his $180 million payout.
By this standard, Donald Trump himself may just spend the first year of his presidency, unpresidentedly creating a framework from which to insulate himself from the onslaught of transparent conflicts of interest he will embark upon in 2018. The good news is that he may have the new iPhone to tweet about it then!
January 28, 2017
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
politics, Religion and ethics, USA |
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Five anti-Trident protesters found guilty after blockading nuclear bomb factory The group argued they were putting their religious beliefs into action BY blockading the AWE Burghfield The Independent Jon Stone Political Correspondent @joncstone 27 Jan 17, Five anti-Trident protesters have been found guilty of blockading a nuclear weapons manufacturing facility – days after new concerns were raised about the safety of Britain’s Trident nuclear missiles.
The protesters, who barred the entrance to Burghfield Atomic Weapons Establishment in Berkshire in June of last year, were from the Christian group Put Down the Sword / Trident Ploughshares.
Trident mounted nuclear warheads are assembled at Burghfield, which has been the site of repeated demonstrations for a number of years. The MoD said work on the missile system was disrupted by the protests……
The activists’ defence team argued that they were acting in accordance with their religious beliefs, which they said were protected by the Human Rights Act.However district judge Khan said that he did not agree that “that the actions of the defendants were a manifestation of a religious belief” and in any case that “these rights have to yield to the primary right of passing and re-passing the highway” outside the base…….
A joint statement from the defendants said: “We stand by what we said in court: Trident is an illegal and immoral waste of money, a crime against humanity and God.
“The prosecution said we could just have joined in a prayer vigil to the side of the road, instead of lying in it; we said our consciences wouldn’t allow that. We believe prayer is important but sometimes our faith compels us to put our whole bodies in the way of injustice and violence.“The Bible says religious acts are meaningless unless we also stand up for the poor and needy; we are called to bring a just peace with hope for all. We will continue to seek peace, and to take the consequences of doing so. It’s a small price to pay for the chance to challenge an evil like nuclear weapons.”http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/trident-burghfield-reading-nuclear-missiles-bomb-factory-base-protests-guilty-a7549261.html
January 28, 2017
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
Legal, opposition to nuclear, Religion and ethics, UK |
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US Humanitarian Aid Goes to North Korea Despite Nuclear Tensions, VOA, January 25, 2017 Baik Sung-won WASHINGTON — The United States has provided $1 million in humanitarian aid to impoverished North Korea, the U.S. State Department said Wednesday.
Despite growing tensions between North Korea and Washington, the U.S. sent the assistance last week on the day before President Donald Trump was sworn in and took over the U.S. government.
It marks the first time that the U.S. provided humanitarian assistance to the North since 2011, when it provided relief items including medical supplies to North Korean flood victims. That aid, worth $900,000, was made through Samaritan’s Purse, a U.S.-based humanitarian aid organization.
Aid to help typhoon damageThe current assistance comes in the aftermath of Typhoon Lionrock, which hit North Korea in August with heavy rain that resulted in flooding. At the time, the government reported hundreds were dead and missing, and said thousands had lost their homes. International aid organizations responded immediately.
Outgoing Secretary of State John Kerry awarded $1 million for North Korea to UNICEF, a U.N. agency, the day before President Donald Trump took office last week………http://www.voanews.com/a/united-states-humanitarian-aid-goes-to-north-korea/3692811.html
January 27, 2017
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Pope spurs Republicans to shift climate views, EurekAlert, 24 Jan 17 CORNELL UNIVERSITY After Pope Francis framed climate change as a moral issue in his second encyclical, conservative Republicans shifted and began to see environmental dilemmas in the same way, according to a new study led by Cornell University communication researchers.
“When Pope Francis issued his encyclical paper in June 2015, he emerged as a strong advocate for climate action,” said Jonathon P. Schuldt, assistant professor of communication. “He is in many ways uniquely positioned as a global moral authority – a religious authority – and his position is very visible.”
Schuldt, along with Adam R. Pearson of Pomona College and Rainer Romero-Canyas and Dylan Larson-Konar, both of the Environmental Defense Fund, sought to understand a mechanism for changing public opinion about climate change. Their research, “Brief Exposure to Pope Francis Heightens Moral Beliefs About Climate Change,” was published online in the journal Climatic Change, Dec. 30.
The pontiff addressed waste, culture and modern day ills in the encyclical. Climate change is a global problem with grave environmental, social, economic and political implications, the pope wrote. Many of the world’s poor live in areas particularly affected by phenomena related to global warming, and their subsistence depends on keeping Earth healthy. They have few resources to help them adapt to climate change, the pope said.
For this research, more than 1,200 U.S. adults were asked for their moral beliefs about climate change. …….https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-01/cu-psr012417.php
January 27, 2017
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climate change, Religion and ethics, USA |
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Faith leaders reframe climate change as moral issue Marion Renault The Columbus Dispatch • Friday January 13, 2017
Priests, pastors and ministers nationwide are spreading the gospel of climate change — as are imams and rabbis.
In recent years, faith-based advocacy has emerged as a powerful tool in the environmental movement. By reframing climate change and sustainability as moral issues, religious leaders hope to advance environmentalism by elevating it above the political fray.
“I believe that all religions, all faiths share a common goodness,” said Zerqa Abid, founder of My Project USA, a Muslim youth organization in Columbus. “All of us have to look within our houses, within our cities, in our everyday lives.
“We take care of the Earth, or we destroy it.”
Americans report fairly high levels of spirituality, but most do not view climate change as a moral issue, according to a 2015 survey by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication.
Presenting climate change as a spiritual issue could be a successful strategy for attracting religious folks to environmental causes, the report suggests.
In Ohio, three-fourths of voters identify as religious, but little more than half say environmental laws are worth the cost, according to 2016 Pew Research Center surveys.
“Hitting people in the head with science doesn’t get them in the heart,” said Deborah Steele, fiscal officer for Clinton Township who previously worked for three years as an Ohio Interfaith Power and Light coordinator. “What gets people is a matter of conscience and not the logic of science.”
As leaders of intimate community spaces, religious officials are beginning to address the human-rights implications of climate change.
For example, exploitation of natural resources severely affects the world’s poorest populations and violates divine dictates on how people should treat the planet, said Rabbi Alex Braver of Tifereth Israel.
“The big-picture view, that’s what religion can offer,” Braver said. “I think (environmentalism) has very deep roots in ancient text and tradition, but it’s been lifted up in a different way now that we’re seeing the immense power we can have over the environment.”……….
At a rally on Monday, people from across several faiths and campaigns called on U.S. Sen. Rob Portman, a Republican from Ohio, to reject nominees for President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet who deny climate change or come from the fossil-fuel industry.
Among the people who attended was Aline Yamada and her two children. Yamada, a Buddhist from Clintonville, said she feels a parallel between her beliefs and the protest’s message.
“We are all connected,” she said. “I think this is the biggest moral challenge of our time.” mrenault@dispatch.com
@MarionRenault http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2017/01/13/faith-leaders-reframe-climate-change-as-moral-issue.html#
January 14, 2017
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
climate change, Religion and ethics, USA |
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The pope’s remarks came during a gathering of scientists at the Vatican, at which he said there has “never been such a clear need for science” to guide human actions to safeguard the future of the planet.
“It is worth noting that international politics has reacted weakly — albeit with some praiseworthy exceptions — regarding the concrete will to seek the common good and universal goods, and the ease with which well-founded scientific opinion about the state of our planet is disregarded,” the pontiff said, according to a translation provided by the Vatican. He added that the “‘distraction’ or delay” in implementing global agreements on the environment demonstrates how politics have become submissive “to a technology and an economy which seek profit above all else.”
[Trump victory reverses U.S. energy and environmental priorities]
Trump, who is set to become one of the only world leaders to question the notion of global warming, has vowed to “cancel” U.S. participation in the international climate accord signed last year in Paris, in which countries pledged to cut carbon dioxide emissions sharply in coming years. In addition, Trump has called for rolling back pollution regulations on the oil, gas and coal industries and shrinking the role of the Environmental Protection Agency.
This week’s comments echoed an encyclical regarding the environment issued by Francis last year in which he wrote about the “urgent challenge to protect our common home” and argued that “the earth herself, burdened and laid waste, is among the most abandoned and maltreated of our poor.”
At the Vatican, Francis praised the work of scientists, who he said must remain independent and emerge as leaders in fighting for climate action.
“I would say that it falls to scientists, who work free of political, economic or ideological interests, to develop a cultural model which can face the crisis of climatic change and its social consequences,” he said, “so that the vast potential of productivity will not be reserved for only a few.”
December 9, 2016
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2 WORLD, climate change, Religion and ethics |
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Addressing a group of scientists that included theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, the pope gave his strongest speech on the environment since the election of Trump, who has threatened to pull out of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change.
“The ‘distraction’ or delay in implementing global agreements on the environment shows that politics has become submissive to a technology and economy which seek profit above all else,” Francis said.
Francis, who wrote an encyclical, or papal letter, on the environment last year, took a swipe at those who dispute that climate change is caused by human activity, criticising “the ease with which well-founded scientific opinion about the state of our planet is disregarded”.
During the campaign, Trump called climate change a hoax.
Last week he appeared to soften his stance, telling The New York Times he was keeping “an open mind” and that there might be “some connectivity” between human activity and global warming.
But days later, Reince Priebus, Trump’s designated White House chief-of-staff, told Fox News that the president-elect still believed climate change was mostly “a bunch of bunk”.
In his speech, the Pope said scientists should “work free of political, economic or ideological interests, to develop a cultural model which can face the crisis of climatic change and its social consequences”.
A US withdrawal from the pact, agreed to by almost 200 countries, would set back international efforts to limit rising temperatures that have been linked to the extinction of animals and plants, heat waves, floods and rising sea levels.
Francis called for “an ecological conversion capable of supporting and promoting sustainable development”.
He said humans could not consider themselves “owners and masters of nature, authorised to plunder it without any consideration of its hidden potential and laws of development”.
n his encyclical last year to the world’s 1.2 billion Roman Catholics, the Pope called for swift action to save the planet from environmental ruin and urged world leaders to hear “the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor”.
November 30, 2016
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2 WORLD, climate change, Religion and ethics |
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Islamic Society of North America Announces Divest-Invest Commitment http://www.greenfaith.org/programs/divest-and-reinvest/islamic-society-of-north-america-announces-fossil-fuel-divestment Statement of Dr. Azhar Azeez
President of the Islamic Society of North America 9 Safar 1438 AH/10 November 2016
ISNA was proud to have been an important part of the organizing of the Marrakech Conference back in April of this year at which scholars and Muslim leaders from around the globe affirmed the message of the Prophet Muhammed (AS) Suluh Medina (Charter) as a model and basis for interfaith cooperation common action as we strive for a better and more fair and just world.
ISNA also has a proud tradition of partnering with other national faith communities on issues and causes of justice including the Shoulder-To-Shoulder Campaign and most recently signing along with other national and world faith leaders the COP 22 Interfaith Climate Statement to be presented in Marrakech today.
“According to Islam’s most basic and fundamental teachings, human beings have been uniquely charged with the great responsibility of being Guardians and Caretakers of the Earth. It goes against the overall service based mission ISNA, to invest in fossil fuel companies whose operations and products cause such grave harm to humanity and to Creation and ISNA commits herself to this cause.”
The Islamic Society of North America is the largest US Muslim umbrella organization. Established in 1963 as the Muslim Students Association of the US and Canada, ISNA’s affiliate and constituent organizations include the North American Islamic Trust (NAIT), Islamic Medical Association of North America (IMANA), Association of Muslim Scientists and Engineers (ASME), Association of Muslim Social Scientists (AMSS), Council of Islamic Schools of North America (CISNA), Muslim Students Association (MSA) and Muslim Youth of North America (MYNA). For information about ISNA, see www.isna.net.
Contact: Imam Saffet Abid Catovic, Board Member, ISNA Green Mosque Task Force; saffetac@aol.com
November 19, 2016
Posted by Christina Macpherson |
2 WORLD, climate change, Religion and ethics |
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Faith groups state nuclear weapons ‘incompatible with values of faith traditions’ at UN General Assembly First CommitteeFifth joint statement highlighting moral and humanitarian aspects of nuclear weapons,Religion News Service, 13 Oct 16 NEW YORK — On October 12, a joint statement by religious organizations calling for abolition of nuclear weapons was introduced during the civil society presentations at the UN General Assembly First Committee on Disarmament and International Security.
Dr. Emily Welty, Vice Moderator of the World Council of Churches Commission on International Affairs, introduced the Public Statement in Support of the Multilateral Negotiation of a Nuclear Weapons Ban in 2017, which reads in part: “Nuclear weapons are incompatible with the values upheld by our respective faith traditions which are also foundational elements in the development of international law—the right of people to live in security and dignity; the commands of conscience and justice; the duty to protect the vulnerable and to exercise the stewardship that will safeguard the planet for current and future generations… ”
This is the fifth time the group, calling itself “Faith Communities Concerned about the Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons,” has issued such a statement. On this occasion, individuals representing 11 faith-based organizations from the Christian, Buddhist and Islamic traditions have signed the statement so far. The statement can be read in full here……….http://religionnews.com/2016/10/13/faith-groups-state-nuclear-weapons-incompatible-with-values-of-faith-traditions-at-un-general-assembly-first-committee/
October 14, 2016
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There’s been the usual evasion and wilful dishonesty on the part of both EdF and the Government as to exactly how the costs of managing that waste over the projected 30-year lifetime of Hinkley Point will be paid for. In the first instance, how best should EdFbe required to accrue for a sufficient share of revenue to cover those costs arising during the reactor’s lifetime – and then for decades/centuries beyond that once HinkleyPoint has stopped generating?
This is such a huge issue – financially and morally. The sums of money involved in treating, storing and finally disposing of nuclear waste are eye-watering, and if they were properly factored into the day-to-day operating costs of all nuclear power stations, it would make the whole ludicrous edifice finally topple over.
this is not just a managerially incompetent, technologically redundant, financially bankrupt and wilfully dishonest industry – it is inherently immoral.
The Hinkley Horror Story: Don’t Mention the Waste! http://www.jonathonporritt.com/blog/hinkley-horror-story-dont-mention-waste I haven’t been able to bring myself to write anything about Hinkley Point since the UK Government gave the go-ahead on 15th September. I suppose I’ve lived for so long with the inevitability of this insane project being approved, at some point, notwithstanding the endless delays, that I wasn’t particularly surprised when it happened. Just a weird mixture of resigned, weary and enraged.
Deep down, I still don’t believe that Hinkley Point will ever be completed. I’ve no doubt work will start in one or two years’ time (just as soon as a mountain of continuing problems at EdF’s project at Flamanville have either been resolved or permanently buried), but it won’t be long before the inherent ‘unconstructability’ of this particular reactor design (the EPR) sees exactly the same inevitable delays and cost overruns kick in – and keep on kicking in from that point on.
And somewhere along the way, there’s an equally strong likelihood of EdF/Areva going bust – or having its role comprehensively redefined by the French Government so that it focusses solely on managing upgrades in the French reactor fleet and dealing with all the legacy issues.
And those legacy issues are vast. As they are for all nuclear operators all around the world. Which is the main reason, I suspect, why hardly anyone has been talking about what’s been agreed in terms of dealing with all the new nuclear waste that would be generated by Hinkley Point.
There’s been the usual evasion and wilful dishonesty on the part of both EdF and the Government as to exactly how the costs of managing that waste over the projected 30-year lifetime of Hinkley Point will be paid for. In the first instance, how best should EdFbe required to accrue for a sufficient share of revenue to cover those costs arising during the reactor’s lifetime – and then for decades/centuries beyond that once HinkleyPoint has stopped generating?
This is such a huge issue – financially and morally. The sums of money involved in treating, storing and finally disposing of nuclear waste are eye-watering, and if they were properly factored into the day-to-day operating costs of all nuclear power stations, it would make the whole ludicrous edifice finally topple over.
Nobody’s thought more about these legacy issues, going back to the origins of the nuclear industry here in the UK in the 1950s, than Andy Blowers. His new book, ‘The Legacy of Nuclear Power’, has just been published, and even for those who have been tracking this particularly wretched aspect of an almost entirely wretched industry, it’s a pretty mind-boggling story that emerges.
Here are the words that I contributed by way of an endorsement for ‘The Legacy of Nuclear Power’:
“The nuclear industry invites us, all the time, to look forward – never to look back. Andy Blowers’ compelling study shows why: its legacy, all around the world, is a shocking one, with no long-term solutions to the problem of nuclear waste in sight, and countless communities blighted, in one way or another, by the nuclear incubus in their midst.”
Unbelievably, the UK’s dismal record in managing its nuclear waste (for both military and civilian facilities) is no worse than that of the USA (with the Hanford site in Washington State posing equally horrendous, ongoing legacy issues as Sellafield here in the UK) or of France, with its reprocessing waste management facilities at La Hague. Only Germany can demonstrate a rather better record – though that has little to do either with the industry or with the German Government, and everything to do with an implacably hostile anti-nuclear movement which has fought for decades to ensure that Germany’s nuclear waste should not be dumped at the designatedGorleben site and then forgotten about.
Andy has written an excellent summary article about these four sites.
(And for the story about what’s going on at Sellafield – in terms of the UK’s nuclear fuel reprocessing debacle – check out this article from Ian Fairlie, commenting on BBC Panorama’s recent exposé.)
What I most admire about Andy’s analysis is that it not only covers the all-but-unbelievable financial consequences of our nuclear legacy, but forces people to confront the moral implications of an industry that defers costs not just into the future but across generations.
One of the reasons why I’m still passionate about the concept of sustainable development (rather than the environment per se) is its unwavering advocacy ofintergenerational justice: being explicit about what any one generation owes to all those generations that succeed it. The nuclear industry today only survives by ruthlessly ignoring those intergenerational obligations: the economics of nuclear power only ‘work’ because it dumps the intractable problems of managing its waste onto future generations.
In other words, this is not just a managerially incompetent, technologically redundant, financially bankrupt and wilfully dishonest industry – it is inherently immoral.
And yet, even now, there are a few misguided environmentalists who tell us that our low-carbon future depends on investing yet more countless billions of dollars in this failed horror story of an industry.
October 8, 2016
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Religion and ethics, UK, wastes |
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Vatican Radio , 26 Sept 16 The Vatican told the United Nations on Monday “nuclear arms offer a false sense of security, and that the uneasy peace promised by nuclear deterrence is a tragic illusion.”
“Nuclear weapons cannot create for us a stable and secure world,” said Archbishop Bernardito Auza, the Permanent Observer of the Holy See to the United Nations.
He was speaking at an event marking the International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons.
“Peace and international stability cannot be founded on mutually assured destruction or on the threat of total annihilation,” the Vatican diplomat said. The full statement of Archbishop Auza can be found below……….http://en.radiovaticana.va/news/2016/09/27/holy_see_peace_of_nuclear_deterrence_a_tragic_illusion/1260960
September 28, 2016
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Pope concerned over North Korea’s nuclear testing, Crux, Inés San Martín
September 27, 2016 VATICAN CORRESPONDENT The United States has flown nuclear-capable supersonic bombers over ally South Korea in a show of force meant to cow North Korea after its fifth nuclear test and also to settle rattled nerves in the South.
“The Holy See supports continued efforts by the international community to revive negotiations over denuclearization and to enable the IAEA to resume its critical role in nuclear verification there,” says Monsignor Antoine Camilleri, Vatican Undersecretary for Relations with States. ROME-Watching the continuing tension on the Korean Peninsula, with North Korea carrying out nuclear tests, a Vatican’s representative has expressed Pope Francis’s concerns to Vienna’s International Atomic Energy Agency.
Vatican spokesman Greg Burke said on Tuesday that he could confirm that, considering the “delicate situation on the Korean Peninsula,” the Vatican’s Undersecretary for Relations with States, Monsignor Antoine Camilleri, had reiterated in Vienna “the concern of the Holy Father and the Holy See about the continuing tensions in the area on account of the nuclear tests carried out by North Korea.”
Last Tuesday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) had reported that North Korea had successfully conducted a ground test of a new type of high-powered rocket engine.
Camillieri was speaking as the Vatican representative in the 60th General Assembly of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEG), taking place in Vienna Sept. 26-30.
“We view the situation in the DPRK [Democratic People’s Republic of Korea] with grave concern,” Camillieri said in his remarks. “The Holy See supports continued efforts by the international community to revive negotiations over denuclearization and to enable the IAEA to resume its critical role in nuclear verification there.”
The Vatican representative also said the Church welcomes the IAEA’s participation in the “verification and monitoring of Iran’s nuclear-related commitments under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action,” adding that the Holy See sees this agreement positively…….. Talking about disarmament, he again quoted Francis, but this time from the pontiff’s message to the Vienna Conference on the Humanitarian Impact of Nuclear Weapons in 2014, when the Argentine pope said that spending on these weapons squanders a country’s wealth.
“To prioritize such spending is a mistake and a misallocation of resources which would be far better invested in the areas of integral human development, education, health and the fight against extreme poverty. When these resources are squandered, the poor and the weak living on the margins of society pay the price,” the pope had said in the message Camillieri quoted on Tuesday. https://cruxnow.com/vatican/2016/09/27/pope-concerned-north-koreas-nuclear-testing/
September 28, 2016
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North Korea, politics international, Religion and ethics, South Korea |
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Churches put their faith in green energy, Ft.com , Pilita Clark, Environment Correspondent, 1 Sept 16 Wind and solar farms have always had faithful adherents in the environmental movement but now more than 3,500 churches have turned their back on fossil fuels to embrace renewable energy.
Churches from a range of denominations have either made such a switch or registered their interest in doing so, but Roman Catholics have proved especially keen, according to figures from religious charities released on Thursday.
Nearly 2,000 Roman Catholic parishes have forsaken conventional energy in favour of green electricity in 16 dioceses, the charities said. Some made the decision after Pope Francis issued an encyclical last year urging the world to cut its dependence on fossil fuels.
“Pope Francis challenges us all to ‘care for our common home’, and by adopting renewable energy we will directly help people threatened, and already most severely affected, by climate change,” said John Arnold, Bishop of Salford, one of the 16 dioceses to have switched.
“There are many ways in which we may respond to the threat and the reality of climate change and adopting renewable energy for our church buildings must be a priority.”
In some cases, churches had banded together to use their collective buying power to secure green energy tariffs from companies that bought or produced at least 80 per cent of their electricity from renewable sources, said Tim Gee, campaigns leader at Christian Aid……
The overriding reason for acting, he added, was to send a message to governments and investors that there needed to be a shift away from fossil fuels if the world were to avoid dangerous levels of climate change.
“There really is a wave of enthusiasm for it,” Mr Gee said. “It’s relatively recent and it’s really sped up in the last year.” Some synagogues and mosques had also made the shift, he said.
Some of the companies benefiting from the churches’ shift are smaller green energy groups such as Ecotricity and Good Energy rather than the larger “big six” suppliers.
At least 100 Quaker meeting houses have switched to renewables by dealing directly with seven-year-old Good Energy……
More than 900 Salvation Army buildings have switched to renewable energy suppliers, according to the charities’ data.
Nearly 700 churches from several denominations have individually signed up for green power tariffs through the Big Church Switch website, which offers a simple way for churches to shift to green tariffs……. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3909aeee-6f96-11e6-a0c9-1365ce54b926.html#axzz4J40ssnM7
September 2, 2016
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2 WORLD, Religion and ethics, renewable |
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World can’t afford to silence us’: black church leaders address climate 
change
One of the largest and oldest black churches in the US warns that black people are disproportionally harmed by global warming and fossil fuel pollution, Guardian, Oliver Milman, 24 July 16, African American religious leaders have added their weight to calls for action on climate change, with one of the largest and oldest black churches in the US warning that black people are disproportionally harmed by global warming and fossil fuel pollution.
The African Methodist Episcopal church has passed its first resolution in its 200-year history devoted to climate change, calling for a swift transition to renewable energy.
“We can move away from the dirty fuels that make us sick and shift toward safe, clean energy like wind and solar that help make every breath our neighbors and families take a healthy one,” states the resolution, which also points to research showing that black children are four times as likely as white children to die from asthma.
The
resolution was passed at the church’s general conference in Philadelphia, where more than 30,000 members gathered. The AME church, the oldest independent Protestant denomination founded by black people in the world, has about 7,000 congregations and 2.5m members.
“Damage to our climate puts the health of children, elderly, and those with chronic illnesses at greater risk and disproportionately impacts African Americans. We believe it is our duty to commit to taking action and promoting solutions that will help make our families and communities healthier and stronger,” stated Bishop John White, president of the council of bishops of the AME church.
The resolution follows an open letter sent by African American clergy last year that called for political leaders to take “bold action to address climate change”……..
Dupont-Walker said that the church’s voter mobilization campaign will work throughout the 2016 election cycle to question candidates on climate change. Local officials and landlords will also be put under pressure over inadequate housing and infrastructure that helps spread pollution to black communities.
According to the NAACP, African Americans emit far less carbon dioxide per person compared with white people and yet will bear the brunt of heat-related deaths, due to the concentration of black people in cities…….https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/jul/24/african-methodist-episcopal-church-climate-change-letter
July 25, 2016
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climate change, indigenous issues, Religion and ethics |
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Scottish bishops urge Britain to reject nuclear weapons, Crux, Simon Caldwell July 14, 2016
All eight bishops issued a joint statement calling for nuclear disarmament ahead of a July 18 vote in Parliament on whether to renew the Trident submarine-based nuclear weapons system.
The bishops also suggested the $272 billion cost of replacing the aging arsenal of nuclear weapons could not be morally justified.
“The bishops of Scotland have, for a long time, pointed out the immorality of the use of strategic nuclear weapons due to the indiscriminate destruction of innocent human life that their use would cause,” they said.
“Lives are being lost now because money that could be spent on the needy and the poor is tied up in nuclear arsenals,” the bishops said, adding that they endorsed the words of Pope Francis that “spending on nuclear weapons squanders the wealth of nations.”……..
Theresa May, the incoming prime minister and leader of the ruling Conservative Party, is keen to retain a nuclear capacity, but the Labor Party leadership and the Scottish National Party want to scrap the warheads.
The intervention by the Scottish bishops represents the second time in a decade and the third in 35 years that they have called on Britain to rid itself of nuclear weapons.
The statement comes less than a year after Pope Francis marked the 70th anniversary of the day the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Nagasaki, Japan, by inviting humanity to reject war and to “ban nuclear weapons and all weapons of mass destruction.”
It also comes as the Washington Post reported that U.S. President Barack Obama will use his final six months in office to push for a radical reduction of nuclear weapons globally, in the hope that the policy might lead to eventual abolition.MANCHESTER, England – The British government must take “decisive and courageous steps” toward ridding the country of nuclear weapons, the Catholic bishops of Scotland have said.
They said Britain had an obligation under the 1968 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty “to work toward the disposing and elimination of all nuclear weapons.”
“Britain should take more decisive and courageous steps to revive that aspect of the treaty and not seek to prolong the status quo,” the bishops said in the July 12 statement.
July 15, 2016
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Religion and ethics, UK |
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