Justice Matters: COPs and Cribs

It's curious how saving the planet so that human and other life can flourish can sometimes seem perplexingly tedious. It requires international collaboration, which is really hard to achieve.  Those countries who have made commitments meet in a COP, a “Conference of the Parties.”   The biodiversity COP has the goal of protecting nature and halting biodiversity loss. It runs until December 19th.  The climate COP in Egypt, the follow-on from the one in Glasgow last year, recently ended. Many commentators can’t resist writing of COPs and robbers: if you listen to Alok Sharma’s summary of the Egypt climate COP you will see why. Below we look at these COPs, how they connect with Pope Francis’ teaching in Laudato Si’, and mention a couple of the many initiatives that bring hope. 

SEE     In the case of the climate COP, it comprises those countries who signed the Kyoto protocol in 1992 committing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  This was extended by the Paris Agreement as a legally binding international treaty with 196 signatories in 2015, seeking to limit global warming to below 2 degrees C and preferably 1.5 degrees.

The current Biodiversity COP seeks to establish an agreement that corresponds to that Paris one for climate, but committing countries to be attentive to how we can sustain all life on Earth.  Its goal is to protect everything that lives from the harm caused by humans. Pesticide sprays have decimated the insect population and that causes the bird life to suffer, and there are many other examples – such as the effects of pollution.

The two goals – mitigating climate change and loss of species – connect.  For example climate change disrupts seasons (We saw leaves still on the trees in December!), and the disruptions such as more intense extremes of heatwaves, fire, drought, and flood have huge impacts on whether animals can survive.  

REFLECT    Pope Francis calls us in Laudato Si to see ourselves as a part of the Earth, as having sisterly and brotherly relationships with all life. The damage due to human activity causing climate change, pollution, loss of species, and more, are all part of what Pope Francis calls the Cry of the Earth.

 We often read Genesis as proclaiming us as stewards of the Earth – but it's been misinterpreted as if the Earth is ours to exploit. In a recent cluster eco-circle meeting we were regretting this term steward. It is falling out of use, but not fast enough.  It sets us apart from the Earth, not a part of it. We do have responsibility, not as stewards but as the part of the Earth that has thus far mismanaged its relationships and potential, especially in the chaos caused by the industrialised countries.

It is so appropriate that in our cribs we have creatures – and can take delight when children desire dinosaurs and cuddly animals to be there. There is wisdom in the whimsy.  All creatures from all time are in some way in Christ. “Not one thing has its being but in him” (John 1:3). Cribs remind us of the need to cherish not only Jesus, Mary, Joseph and the other people of the time, but also all animals. We cannot be in empathy with people of 2000 years ago if we ignore people and creatures today, if we do not hear the cries of Earth and respond to the oppression of the Palestinians in the land we call holy (See cryforhope.org). 

As the young keep telling us, “The Earth is on fire let’s behave like it!”  The cribs and COPs call us to see that, “the Earth is one, let's behave like it.”

ACT     Can we learn about the COPs and recognise the robbers? It's too simple and convenient to point the finger at the 600 fossil fuel lobbyists in Egypt. We also need to change how we live, to be less exploitative of the finite earth and its resources – as individuals, as communities, as well as in commerce.

Can we add to the pressure on governments to invest in “greening the economy”? Another approach is needed. The New Economics Foundation and  Kate Raworth’s “Doughnut economics”  are prominent in having vision. So indeed is Pope Francis’ “Laudato Si.”

The biodiversity COP is underway, ending on the 19th December.  You might like to explore this website – and pray for a good outcome from this one!

Also, do find novel animals and plants for your home crib – celebrate our unity in diversity, part of the Earth, in Christ, God With Us.

Mike Mineter