For Kathy Ellis, the experience at the Pastoral Care for Climate workshop was life-changing. We are delighted to share Kathy's reflection with you below. We hope you will get a sense of loving community among the 42 pastors who gathered with theologians and scientists in Beaufort, NC, to connect climate change and faith. When our lives are changed, it is often because we more fully realize the life-changing love of God - for us, for our neighbors, and for all creation - and learn to share in it.   The fourth Sunday of Advent is dedicated to love. Today we invite you to give a love offering to Creation Justice Ministries. With your support, we can bring more pastors and ministry leaders to a deeper love of creation and of God. ​ The Pastor’s workshop in Beaufort was life changing. That last session on goal-setting had so much energy and direction. And what a wonderful surprise to hear that the science faculty had gained from being with US! That inspires me to include un-churched populations whenever possible. One  thing I came away with is that it’s not fair to ask a church leader to open a discussion on climate change without this kind of support.  That leader would be “opening a can of worms” that includes the questions “is God abandoning us?” “Does God break His/Her covenant?” if he/she initiates such a discussion --and tells the truth. Pretty daunting. This conference was a model that I hope can be replicated many times.

When my husband picked me up, he was returning from visiting friends in Wilmington, NC. These friends are very church-active. They were all flooded in Hurricane Florence, had had dead animals floating in their yards. Their churches have never mentioned climate change even once. These friends were fascinated that I was attending a faith-based conference on the subject and wanted very much to know more. The need to talk, learn, and pray is very great.

Two other fellows and I listened to Indigenous, church, and environmental leaders over the course of a year. We identified opportunities for Christian communities to follow Indigenous leadership toward ecojustice here in California, and we’ll soon be releasing a resource on this theme.

​We are called to be peacemakers in the way of Jesus, the prince of peace. And yet as many of us are painfully aware, Christianity all too often became a religion of empire for European colonizers, and inflicted violence on the land and Indigenous and Black peoples. Being peacemakers today means that we must pursue repair and restoration for these harms.