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Peter Critchley

Fear and Selfishness and the Environmental Crisis


FEAR AND SELFISHNESS AND THE ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS

Dec 2009


'Act for the sake of love': Archbishop preaches in Copenhagen Cathedral

Sunday 13th December 2009

"We cannot show the right kind of love for our fellow-humans unless we also work at keeping the earth as a place that is a secure home for all people" said the Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, to day at an international ecumenical service in Copenhagen Cathedral at a midpoint during the critical UN Climate Change talks.

http://rowanwilliams.archbishopofcanterbury.org/articles.php/765/act-for-the-sake-of-love-archbishop-preaches-in-copenhagen-cathedral


Archbishop of Canterbury says fear hinders climate change battle

Rowan Williams tells Copenhagen service corporations and governments are afraid to make choices to bring real change

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2009/dec/13/archbishop-canterbury-copenhagen-service


As crucial UN climate change talks entered their second and final week in Copenhagen, church bells in Denmark and other countries rang 350 times, a figure which represents the figure that many scientists believe is a safe level of carbon dioxide in the air: 350 parts per million.

At a church service at Copenhagen's Lutheran cathedral, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams, argued that people are so paralysed by fear and selfishness that they are unable to save the planet. Individuals, corporations and governments are so paralysed with fear that they cannot make the choices required for real and lasting change.

"We are afraid because we don't know how we can survive without the comforts of our existing lifestyle. We are afraid that new policies will be unpopular with a national electorate. We are afraid that younger and more vigorous economies will take advantage of us - or we are afraid that older, historically dominant economies will use the excuse of ecological responsibility to deny us our proper and just development."


Rowan Williams was leading the ecumenical service in the cathedral. Also present were Archbishop Desmond Tutu of South Africa and religious leaders from Tuvalu, Zambia, Mexico and Greenland. Williams called on people to envisage a sustainable and healthy relationship with the world. His message centred on the need for human beings to trust each other in a world in which resources are getting ever more scarce. "How shall we build international institutions that make sure that resources get where they are needed - that 'green taxes' will deliver more security for the disadvantaged, that transitions in economic patterns will not weigh most heavily on those least equipped to cope?"


In an interview with Channel 4 News, Dr Williams cautioned that there are no "quick solutions" to global warming. "I don't think there are any quick solutions, any absolutes here, but I think these are the sorts of issues about energy use particularly, whether it's travel or domestically, that have to be really up in front of our minds."


For Williams, there is a finite amount that individuals could do to make a difference. Foreign holidays are not an "easy call, frankly." Williams urged people to use public transport as much as possible, in the least enquiring about ecologically sustainable travel. To use high-energy consuming vehicles in a city where alternatives were available is irresponsible in face of the climate crisis. "We use a hybrid car for that reason as my official car in London. I'm also coming back from Copenhagen by train on this occasion rather than flying."

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