What we do: Environment and sustainability

Caring for God’s Creation

After months of ‘extreme extremes’, in which record breaking heat waves and floods in many countries have been splashed across our TV screens, with the horrible suffering they bring in their wake, there never has been such an urgent time to focus our attention on climate change.

The UN’s latest report on the science of climate change is unsparing in its conclusion that human activities have ‘unequivocally’ caused global heating, and that this must be curbed, for the sake of all humanity and indeed the whole of Nature – which we believe is God’s Creation.

Recent news and articles

Christian leaders urge protection of creation as COP summit approaches
Ring out for the climate
Energy Footprint Tool wins National Energy Award
Bishops join leaders of other faiths to demand climate action at COP 26 in Glasgow
Celebrating over 100 Eco Churches in the Diocese of London
Creationtide and Climate Sunday: your church’s chance to focus on the climate crisis
Churches Nature Count to assess biodiversity within churchyards
Surge in climate change effort by churches and people
Love, the Second Law and the Resurrection

Whose future?

Climate change and other dangerous environmental changes are a challenge to governments, businesses, people young and old, communities, people, churches. Us. Our lives will change. Our actions can influence how.

In an address to faith leaders on 4th February 2021, ahead of the forthcoming Glasgow conference on climate change, the Archbishop of Canterbury said:

“The Covid-19 pandemic has forced the world to look at how we have been living. We have been confronted by our behaviour: by our sin; our greed; our human fragility; our exploitation of the environment and encroachment on the natural world. For many this uncertainty is new. But many more around the world have been living with uncertainty for decades as the grim, real and present consequence of climate change. To think it is a problem of the future rather than a scourge of the present is the blind perspective of the privileged.

“But the pandemic has also revealed our capacity for change; the opportunities for repentance; the potential for hope amidst suffering.”

We want the voice of children and young people to be heard and reflected in our actions concerning the environment, especially climate change. It is their future.

Christians believe the future is also in God’s hands, and we must ultimately answer to God.

Page index

ALMA and the Environment
An Interconnected World
Biomass Heating
Care for Creation
Churches and People
Church of England Environment Programme
Churchyards and Wildlife
Churchyards for London
Climate Action Finance
Climate Action Programme
Climate Action Projects
Climate and Environmental Risks
Conserving Water
Creation Care Champions
Diocesan Environmental Policy
Diocesan Synod Report 2014
Diocesan Synod Report 2016
Diocesan Synod Report 2018
Diocesan Synod Report 2020
Eco Church
Energy and Carbon, Global Heating and Climate Change
Environment and Mission Action Plans
Environmental Work so Far
Food and Drink
Generating your own Energy
Genetically Modified (GM) Food
Green Energy Suppliers
Heat Pumps
Heating and Energy Use
Landscape, oceans and humans
Lighting and Energy Use
Measuring Energy Use
Smart Metering
Solar Panels
Sustainable Building
The Environment and Mission Action Plans
The Environment around the Year
Transport, Air Travel and the Environment
Trees in Churchyards
Waste Collection and Recycling
Wildlife, Ecology and Biodiversity

To find out more

Contact Brian Cuthbertson, Head of Environment and Sustainability.

External links

• Church of England Environmental Programme
• A Rocha UK and Eco Church
• Operation Noah (ON).