• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Joint Public Issues Team

Churches working for peace and justice

  • Home Page
  • Who We Are
    • Six hopes for society
  • Issues
    • Economy
      • Tax Justice
      • Reset The Debt
      • Living Wage
    • Environment
      • Net Zero In My Neighbourhood
    • Poverty and Inequality
      • The Cost of Living Crisis
      • Universal Credit
      • Truth and Lies
      • Enough
      • Rethink Sanctions
      • Faith in Foodbanks
      • Housing and Homelessness
    • Asylum and Migration
      • Refugees
      • End Hostility
      • The Asylum System
    • Peacemaking
      • The Arms Trade
      • Nuclear Weapons
      • Drones
      • Peacemaking resources
    • Politics and Elections
      • Elections
      • Meet Your MP
      • Art of the Possible
      • Brexit
    • Other Issues
      • International Development
      • Modern Slavery and Exploitation
        • Forced labour in fashion
  • Get Involved
    • JPIT Conference 2022
    • Newsletter
    • Events
    • Walking with Micah
  • Resources
    • Advent
    • 10 Minutes on… podcast
    • Politics in the Pulpit?
    • Stay and Pray
    • Season of Creation
    • Prayers
    • Public Issues Calendar
    • Poetry
    • Small Group Resources
  • Blog

Climate Change and COVID-19

COVID-19, Environment · 20 May, 2020

In recent weeks, news coverage has reported the immense drop in carbon emissions seen globally since the coronavirus pandemic hit. We’re undergoing the biggest carbon crash ever recorded. Emissions dropped 18% in China between February and March, and between 40% and 60% over recent weeks in Europe. Road traffic in the UK has fallen by 70%, and global air traffic has halved.[1]

But this is simply the start. In order for Net Zero targets to be met globally by – at the very latest – 2050, this kind of reduction has to be sustained, and even increased. “If Covid-19 leads to a drop in emissions of around 5% in 2020, then that is the sort of reduction we need every year until net-zero emissions are reached around 2050,” said Glen Peters, from Cicero.[2] Monumental change is required.

However, I find the narrative around the reduction of carbon emissions due to Covid-19 and the subsequent lockdown challenging. On the one hand, I rejoice that creation has been given the space to breathe. That you can see stars in cities, hear birds over less crowded roads and breathe deeply without fear of pollution is truly a joy. It is a glimpse of the kind of world, one day, we might be able to live in.

And yet, Covid-19 and the lockdown has brought immense challenges to millions. It has meant grief, increased pressures on mental and physical health, fear, poverty and huge risk. Many have lost work, and find themselves facing poverty and destitution. Many have lost loved ones. It is not a time we want to re-live, regardless of the environmental benefits it might be having.

Narratives drawing the ‘positive’ link between environmental change and Coronavirus can therefore (either consciously or not) suggest that the changes needed in order to address the climate crisis will require us to undergo these same levels of trauma. This is the first time we have seen a drop in emissions comparable to that required to respond to the climate crisis, but the costs have been huge. Drawing this comparison makes the suggestion that for creation to thrive, humanity must be restrained.

However, I fundamentally don’t believe this to be true. In fact, I believe that a true adjustment to net-zero would mean liberation, not restriction.

The immense poverty, financial and social challenges caused by the crisis are not necessary evils of the changed world needed to respond to the climate crisis. In many ways they are the consequences of our current choices, and the systems and structures they have resulted in). They are consequences of a system tethered to financial growth, which bails out the rich and cuts off those without financial resource from adequate support. A system which prioritises progress in the form of increased wealth, rather than increased wellbeing.

Transition to net-zero doesn’t mean a healthy planet at the cost of a stifled population. In fact, it is an opportunity to untie ourselves from these unhelpful measures of value which only leave people and planet worse off, and instead focus on how both can thrive. During the pandemic, we’ve grown in shared understanding that we all rely on each other, and on key systems of support, for our wellbeing. This and other shifts in understanding move our expectation of value away from pounds, pence and place on the stock market and towards an understanding of what life lived really means.  

 Creation and humanity are inherently intertwined. The flourishing of one need not come at the cost of another – they can thrive together. This is the picture painted by God throughout the bible. God promises a land that is healed with a people who are redeemed, that all might be brought into ‘freedom and glory’ (Romans 8:21).[3]

If we take seriously the need to respond to both the current pandemic and the climate crisis well, we have to be careful with the way we communicate our hope for long-term change. For those of us who care deeply about the renewal of creation, we have a responsibility to help our communities imagine a future which isn’t full of risk and trauma, but hope and liberation. We have an opportunity to help our neighbours, family and friends see and understand the need for change, and the ways we can uphold justice and equity through a sustainable transition. The language we use – the metaphors, comparisons and images – play a big part in this.

The pandemic has highlighted huge fractures in the way our systems and structures burden people and planet. In light of this, might we take this time to invest in narratives which continue to fix our eyes on the hope that God promises, recognising that a just future for people and planet is possible.

How have you been finding hope for a more just and equitable future? Let us know, by tweeting us @PublicIssues or emailing us at enquiries@jpit.uk.


[1] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-52485712

[2] https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-52485712

[3] https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Romans+8%3A20-21&version=NIV

Filed Under: COVID-19, Environment

Hannah Brown

I am the Campaigns and Church Engagement Officer for JPIT. My role involves working with the team to ensure that our campaigns are run effectively, and helping to empower local churches to engage with social justice and effective change-making. I have a background in local church partnership and engagement, and enjoy exploring how we communicate for effective change. I am particularly excited to see how JPIT can empower the church to be a voice of hope and transformation, particularly for those marginalised and disempowered by the systems of society.

Previous Post: « Racial injustice highlighted by COVID-19
Next Post: Call for changes to the Domestic Abuse Bill »

Primary Sidebar

Search

Recent Posts

  • JPIT’s Review of 2022
  • What does Government Support for Asylum Seekers really provide?
  • God with Us – the Refugees of Calais and Dunkirk
  • How can we respond to COP27?
  • Statement on the conclusion of the COP27 Climate Conference in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt
  • COP27 – what should we be looking for?
  • “He has filled the hungry with good things” – What we need from the Autumn Budget
  • What are the stories we should tell about the humanitarian crisis at Manston Airport Asylum centre?
  • How can we be sure that the products we buy are not the result of modern slavery?
  • Why I hate Warm Banks (and why my church is opening one)
  • How does our theology call us to challenge Poverty?
  • Introducing Alfie
  • Biden says nuclear risk is the highest since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis
  • Churches respond to risk to benefit levels
  • Briefing on the ‘Mini Budget’ for the Enough to Live group
  • Introducing Hazel
  • Introducing Hannah
  • An energy cap announcement in three parts: the good, the absent and the ugly
  • Afghanistan and the UK – One Year On from the Fall Of Kabul
  • Inflation, interest rates and the poorest

Subscribe to our monthly newsletter

Footer

Follow us

  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Twitter
  • YouTube

Quick links

Stay and Pray
Politics in the Pulpit
Faith in Politics podcast
Public Issues Calendar
Useful Links

Our work

About Us
Meet the Team
Join the Team 
Internship
Our Newsletter

Contact us

25 Marylebone Road
London NW1 5JR

Tel: 020 7916 8632

enquiries@jpit.uk

Copyright © 2023 · Showcase Pro on Genesis Framework · WordPress · Log in