COP26 Outcomes: A Conversation from an Ethical and Human Rights Perspective

The Geneva Interfaith Forum on Climate Change, Environment and Human Rights (GIF) invites you to attend a webinar on COP26 Outcomes – A Conversation from an Ethical and Human Rights Perspective

10 December 2021 (Friday), 13h00 to 14h15 CET

Link to join: COP 26 outcomes and debriefing – YouTube

Panelists:

· Mr. Vice Yu, South Centre, Loss and Damage Lead Negotiator for G77+China

· Ms. Eileen Mairena, CADP, Active Observer of the UNFCCC Green Climate Fund

· Ms. Amanda Kron, OHCHR Associate Expert on Climate Change

· Ms. Alexandra Goossens-Ishii, Soka Gakkai International and GIF

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CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Human Rights, please email the co-chairs at bobbinassar@gmail.com or bknotts@uua.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit congocsd.wordpress.com.

COP26 Outcomes: A Conversation from an Ethical and Human Rights Perspective

The Geneva Interfaith Forum on Climate Change, Environment and Human Rights (GIF) invites you to attend a webinar on COP26 Outcomes – A Conversation from an Ethical and Human Rights Perspective

10 December 2021 (Friday), 13h00 to 14h15 CET

Link to join: COP 26 outcomes and debriefing – YouTube

Panelists:

· Mr. Vice Yu, South Centre, Loss and Damage Lead Negotiator for G77+China

· Ms. Eileen Mairena, CADP, Active Observer of the UNFCCC Green Climate Fund

· Ms. Amanda Kron, OHCHR Associate Expert on Climate Change

· Ms. Alexandra Goossens-Ishii, Soka Gakkai International and GIF

___________________________________________________________________________________________

CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Human Rights, please email the co-chairs at bobbinassar@gmail.com or bknotts@uua.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit congocsd.wordpress.com.

The Climate Emergency: Does Religion Matter?

You are invited to “The Climate Emergency: Does Religion Matter?”, the latest installment of the Temple of Understanding’s ECO JUSTICE FOR ALL Dialogues. These are special intimate discussions about the climate emergency with international ChangeMakers.

ECO JUSTICE FOR ALL interviews and dialogues are ongoing programs presented by the Temple of Understanding, incorporating our outreach in the area of environmental awareness and advocacy. We present a diverse range of perspectives, from scientific to spiritual views, on the climate emergency and offer a variety of solutions that we can all do easily and effectively in our everyday lives. World religious and spiritual visionaries, Indigenous leaders, scientists and social scientists, environmental activists, artists, musicians and writers, youth and elders, local and global people, all come together to address the urgency of the climate crisis through these ongoing interviews and dialogues.

Register here!

Speakers:

Rabbi Ellen Bernstein is an eco-theologian, spiritual leader, writer and creative. She founded Shomrei Adamah, Keepers of the Earth, the first national Jewish environmental organization in 1988. Her books include Let the Earth Teach You Torah, Ecology and the Jewish Spirit, and The Splendor of Creation. Ellen also created the first ecologically-centered Tu B’Sh’vat (Jewish New Year of theTrees) seder in 1988 and popularized Tu B’Sh’vat as a community-wide inter-spiritual ecological arts celebration for all peoples. Her most recent book, The Promise of the Land, A Passover Haggadah is the first comprehensive, ecological haggadah (guidebook) for Passover (Behrman House, 2020). In 2020 during the pandemic, Ellen launched the Earth Seder movement, helping to organize several dozen world-wide Earth Seders on Zoom. Ellen continues to write and teach on the ecology of the Hebrew Bible, and serves on the advisory board of the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology. To learn more please visit ellenbernstein.org and thepromiseoftheland.com.

Theodore Hiebert writes about biblical perspectives on the environment and about biblical views of identity and difference. His book The Yahwist’s Landscape: Nature and Religion in Early Israel challenges claims that the Bible privileges humans and separates them from nature, and it shows how biblical religion is grounded in the natural world. He has made contributions about biblical perspectives on nature to such works as The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, The Oxford Companion to the Bible, Earth and Word: Classic Sermons on Saving the Planet, and Interpretation. He is the author of the article on Genesis for the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of the Bible and Ecology. Ted was the lead translator of the Book of Genesis and one of the editors for the recent English translation, the Common English Bible (CEB). He wrote the notes to Genesis for the CEB Study Bible and for the New Interpreter’s Study Bible, based on the New Revised Standard Version. He is the Old Testament editor for Abingdon Press’s Covenant Bible Study. Ted also writes about biblical views of identity and difference. His book The Beginning of Difference: Discovering Identity in God’s Diverse World challenges exclusivist cultural interpretations of the book of Genesis and reveals a text that embraces and celebrates ethnic identities and differences. It contains a reinterpretation of the story of Babel as positive account of the origin of the world’s cultures. God’s Big Plan, which he co-authored with Elizabeth Caldwell, is a children’s story of Babel based on this new interpretation. Ted is currently at work on a study of the book of Genesis as migration literature. Ted is a member of the Mennonite Church and has served as pastor of the Boston Mennonite Congregation. He is a frequent lecturer and teacher in adult education programs in churches in the Chicago area. He is Francis A. McGaw Professor of Old Testament and Dean of the Faculty Emeritus at McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago and lives in Homewood, IL.

___________________________________________________________________________________________

CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit congocsd.wordpress.com.

The Climate Emergency: Does Religion Matter?

You are invited to “The Climate Emergency: Does Religion Matter?”, the latest installment of the Temple of Understanding’s ECO JUSTICE FOR ALL Dialogues. These are special intimate discussions about the climate emergency with international ChangeMakers.

ECO JUSTICE FOR ALL interviews and dialogues are ongoing programs presented by the Temple of Understanding, incorporating our outreach in the area of environmental awareness and advocacy. We present a diverse range of perspectives, from scientific to spiritual views, on the climate emergency and offer a variety of solutions that we can all do easily and effectively in our everyday lives. World religious and spiritual visionaries, Indigenous leaders, scientists and social scientists, environmental activists, artists, musicians and writers, youth and elders, local and global people, all come together to address the urgency of the climate crisis through these ongoing interviews and dialogues.

Register here!

Speakers:

Rabbi Ellen Bernstein is an eco-theologian, spiritual leader, writer and creative. She founded Shomrei Adamah, Keepers of the Earth, the first national Jewish environmental organization in 1988. Her books include Let the Earth Teach You Torah, Ecology and the Jewish Spirit, and The Splendor of Creation. Ellen also created the first ecologically-centered Tu B’Sh’vat (Jewish New Year of theTrees) seder in 1988 and popularized Tu B’Sh’vat as a community-wide inter-spiritual ecological arts celebration for all peoples. Her most recent book, The Promise of the Land, A Passover Haggadah is the first comprehensive, ecological haggadah (guidebook) for Passover (Behrman House, 2020). In 2020 during the pandemic, Ellen launched the Earth Seder movement, helping to organize several dozen world-wide Earth Seders on Zoom. Ellen continues to write and teach on the ecology of the Hebrew Bible, and serves on the advisory board of the Yale Forum on Religion and Ecology. To learn more please visit ellenbernstein.org and thepromiseoftheland.com.

Theodore Hiebert writes about biblical perspectives on the environment and about biblical views of identity and difference. His book The Yahwist’s Landscape: Nature and Religion in Early Israel challenges claims that the Bible privileges humans and separates them from nature, and it shows how biblical religion is grounded in the natural world. He has made contributions about biblical perspectives on nature to such works as The New Interpreter’s Dictionary of the Bible, The Oxford Companion to the Bible, Earth and Word: Classic Sermons on Saving the Planet, and Interpretation. He is the author of the article on Genesis for the forthcoming Oxford Handbook of the Bible and Ecology. Ted was the lead translator of the Book of Genesis and one of the editors for the recent English translation, the Common English Bible (CEB). He wrote the notes to Genesis for the CEB Study Bible and for the New Interpreter’s Study Bible, based on the New Revised Standard Version. He is the Old Testament editor for Abingdon Press’s Covenant Bible Study. Ted also writes about biblical views of identity and difference. His book The Beginning of Difference: Discovering Identity in God’s Diverse World challenges exclusivist cultural interpretations of the book of Genesis and reveals a text that embraces and celebrates ethnic identities and differences. It contains a reinterpretation of the story of Babel as positive account of the origin of the world’s cultures. God’s Big Plan, which he co-authored with Elizabeth Caldwell, is a children’s story of Babel based on this new interpretation. Ted is currently at work on a study of the book of Genesis as migration literature. Ted is a member of the Mennonite Church and has served as pastor of the Boston Mennonite Congregation. He is a frequent lecturer and teacher in adult education programs in churches in the Chicago area. He is Francis A. McGaw Professor of Old Testament and Dean of the Faculty Emeritus at McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago and lives in Homewood, IL.

___________________________________________________________________________________________

CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit congocsd.wordpress.com.

What the world religious leaders are doing about the climate crisis

Hosted by the Temple of Understanding, on Oct. 28. Rev. Fletcher Harper and Rev. Brian McGurk will dialogue about the recent “Faith and Science Toward COP26” meeting convened by Pope Francis with 40 world religious leaders and also comment on the Interfaith program called “Faith Plans for People and the Planet” which aims at leveraging religious groups’ assets and investments.

The Rev. Fletcher Harper is an Episcopal priest and the Executive Director of GreenFaith, a global multi-faith climate and environmental justice network. An internationally recognized author, speaker, and pioneer of the worldwide religious environmental movement, he has been a leading voice in the faith community’s response to the climate crisis for the last two decades. He has worked with diverse faith leaders around the world, including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and former United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. Rev. Harper is the co-founder of “Shine”, an international campaign that brings together bold innovators to overcome the threat of entrenched poverty and climate change, and to achieve universal access to affordable and reliable energy. He spearheads the faith-based fossil fuel divestment movement around the world, is one of the faith leaders of the “People’s Climate Marches”, and plays a leading role in the “Interfaith Rainforest Initiative”, a campaign organizing religious communities to fight tropical deforestation and protect Indigenous Peoples’ rights. Rev. Harper is the author of “GreenFaith: Mobilizing God’s People to Protect the Earth.”

Rev. Brian McGurk has served as the Rector of St. Christopher’s Church, Chatham, since 2003, and as the Dean of the Cape Cod and Islands Deanery (2004–14). In the Diocese of Virginia he was the Chairman (of the Board) of the Peter Paul (Children and Youth) Development Center (Richmond); Co-chair of the Virginia Diocesan Commission for South African Partnership; a member of the Overseas Mission Committee and the Diocesan Executive Board. He has led and participated in several mission trips to South Africa and Kenya, and is a graduate of Trinity College and Yale University Divinity School.

ECO JUSTICE FOR ALL interviews and dialogues are ongoing programs produced by the Temple of Understanding, incorporating our outreach in the area of environmental awareness and advocacy. We present a diverse range of perspectives, from scientific to spiritual views, on the climate emergency and offer a variety of solutions that we can all do easily and effectively in our everyday lives. World religious and spiritual visionaries, Indigenous leaders, scientists and social scientists, environmental activists, artists, musicians and writers, youth and elders, local and global people, all come together to address the urgency of the climate crisis through these ongoing interviews and dialogues.

Register here!

__________________________________________________________________________________________CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Spirituality, Values, and Global Concerns-NY, please visit facebook.com/groups/1637987226437203. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit congocsd.wordpress.com.

What the world religious leaders are doing about the climate crisis

Hosted by the Temple of Understanding, on Oct. 28. Rev. Fletcher Harper and Rev. Brian McGurk will dialogue about the recent “Faith and Science Toward COP26” meeting convened by Pope Francis with 40 world religious leaders and also comment on the Interfaith program called “Faith Plans for People and the Planet” which aims at leveraging religious groups’ assets and investments.

The Rev. Fletcher Harper is an Episcopal priest and the Executive Director of GreenFaith, a global multi-faith climate and environmental justice network. An internationally recognized author, speaker, and pioneer of the worldwide religious environmental movement, he has been a leading voice in the faith community’s response to the climate crisis for the last two decades. He has worked with diverse faith leaders around the world, including His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and former United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon. Rev. Harper is the co-founder of “Shine”, an international campaign that brings together bold innovators to overcome the threat of entrenched poverty and climate change, and to achieve universal access to affordable and reliable energy. He spearheads the faith-based fossil fuel divestment movement around the world, is one of the faith leaders of the “People’s Climate Marches”, and plays a leading role in the “Interfaith Rainforest Initiative”, a campaign organizing religious communities to fight tropical deforestation and protect Indigenous Peoples’ rights. Rev. Harper is the author of “GreenFaith: Mobilizing God’s People to Protect the Earth.”

Rev. Brian McGurk has served as the Rector of St. Christopher’s Church, Chatham, since 2003, and as the Dean of the Cape Cod and Islands Deanery (2004–14). In the Diocese of Virginia he was the Chairman (of the Board) of the Peter Paul (Children and Youth) Development Center (Richmond); Co-chair of the Virginia Diocesan Commission for South African Partnership; a member of the Overseas Mission Committee and the Diocesan Executive Board. He has led and participated in several mission trips to South Africa and Kenya, and is a graduate of Trinity College and Yale University Divinity School.

ECO JUSTICE FOR ALL interviews and dialogues are ongoing programs produced by the Temple of Understanding, incorporating our outreach in the area of environmental awareness and advocacy. We present a diverse range of perspectives, from scientific to spiritual views, on the climate emergency and offer a variety of solutions that we can all do easily and effectively in our everyday lives. World religious and spiritual visionaries, Indigenous leaders, scientists and social scientists, environmental activists, artists, musicians and writers, youth and elders, local and global people, all come together to address the urgency of the climate crisis through these ongoing interviews and dialogues.

Register here!

__________________________________________________________________________________________CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Spirituality, Values, and Global Concerns-NY, please visit facebook.com/groups/1637987226437203. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit congocsd.wordpress.com.

Global Interfaith Dialogue on Food Systems

In the run up to the UN Food Systems Summit later in September, the Global Inter-faith Dialogue on Food Systems builds up on the dialogue held in July, aiming to bring together faith-based organisations, Indigenous communities, and others whose work is grounded in values and spirituality and who play an essential role in the sustainable transformation of the food systems.

Register here: https://zoom.us/meeting/register/tJEqcO-vqzMiGNDWKYK3YiRDYqg0G0IkyAL7

The specific objectives of the consultation are:

1. Promote engagement and partnerships between faith-based organisations, indigenous peoples, governments, multilateral organisations, and corporations for more sustainable and just food systems

2. Facilitate conversation around the role of values, ethics, and belief systems into new and better food systems, with a focus on areas for action

Expected outputs:

1. Increased awareness of the important role of faith, values, and belief systems in food systems transformation

2. Lift up good practices and areas for collective action between the work of faith-based, indigenous communities, and other stakeholders in support of achieving the SDGs by 2030

3. An interfaith reflection and a Statement for a sustainable food system

Co-Convenors: Dr. Agnes Kalibata, UN Secretary-General’s Special Envoy of the 2021 Food Systems Summit, and Andrew Schwartz, Director of Sustainability and Global Affairs, Center for Earth Ethics. Curator: Dr. Manoj Kurian, Coordinator, World Council of Churches- Ecumenical Advocacy Alliance

The programme will have brief inputs from key discussants and there will be a substantial session for group work and reporting. The discussants include Ms. Karenna Gore, Director of the Center for Earth Ethics, Rev. Andrew Morley, President and CEO, World Vision International, and ordained curate of the Anglican Church, Ms. Lyla June Johnston, representing Indigenous Peoples, Mr. Anwar Khan, President, of Islamic Relief USA and Bishop Rev. Dr. Sabu K. Cherian, from the Church of South India.

As part of the output, an interfaith Reflection and Statement that is addressed to the UN Food Systems Summit will be introduced and be read by Mr. Steve Chiu – Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation and Dr. Meera Baindur – Associate Professor (Philosophy), Department of Arts, Manipal University Jaipur.

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CoNGO Notes: For more information on the Committee of Religious NGOs at the United Nations, please visit rngos.wordpress.com. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-NY, please visit ngocsd-ny.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Sustainable Development-Vienna, please visit ngocsdvienna.org. For more information on the NGO Committee on Financing for Development, please visit ngosonffd.org.