Snow and Climate Change

Welcome, friends, to the first day the NCC Eco-Justice Program office in DC has been open all week! There have been many titles given to the combo of snow storms that struck the East Coast – Snowpocalypse, Snowmaggeden, Snowtorious BIG – but it is suffice to say that it snowed, alot, breaking records up and down the East Coast for the most snow in a winter.

One of the most interesting conversations to emerge from this bout with snow has been the argument that this disproves climate change, or in some way suggests climate change isn’t happening. It has been all over the news, and in statements coming out from our political leaders. In fact, the Virginia GOP put out an ad calling on Virginians to contact their Congressman who voted for climate legislation in the wake of the snow:

However, as the Colbert Report helpfully notes, a weather event one place doesn’t prove or disprove anything.

The point of this conversation for the faith community, however, is something that I try to emphasize everytime I am given the chance to preach on issues of eco-justice at church gatherings across the country. Our Faith Principles on Global Warming (click here to sign) state that we will, “follow recognized scientific guidelines and recommendations in order to protect all of God’s creation and prevent catastrophic damage to God’s Earth and God’s people”, and this will continue to be the case.

But our call to care for God’s Creation is not contingent on weather events or even on scientific proof. We are called as people of faith to live in relationship with all of God’s People and all of God’s Creation. Part of that means addressing the way we have been living that has caused unbalance amidst that Creation. For us, this is not an issue of politics, or even necessarily of science. It is a call of our faith, as our principles again state, “as people of faith we are guided by the value of sustainability. Sustainability requires that we enable biological and social systems that nurture and support life not be depleted or poisoned.”