The second Uniting Climate Action Network conference is coming up on Saturday 11 May. Titled, Faith in a better future: Organising for climate action, the conference will illuminate ways we as a faith community can address the challenge of global warming and help build the better, safer future we long for.
All this grows out of, as the conference title suggests, our Christian faith. The Uniting Church has been committed to environmental action since its inception. We believe God is the Creator of this world and all its life and that these are inherently “good”. More than that, our church understands that God’s ultimate purpose for the world is renewal and transformation, not destruction by human beings. Those convictions led to the creation of the Synod Climate Action Strategy in 2019, which has morphed into the Stewardship of the Earth focus of the Synod’s Future Directions.
The first climate action conference was in 2021, amidst torrential rain and devastating floods on the north coast of NSW. At that conference we agreed to take bolder action in line with our faith values, and to highlight the voices of our Pasifika community, rural people, young people, and our First Nations peoples. The church has acted on those commitments in various ways, including Uniting Church people meeting with multiple MPs to call for stronger action on global warming, and two big Uniting Pasifika community led climate action forums in April 2022 and October 2023.
The conference will cover issues like the challenges facing rural communities, what young people are doing and calling us to do, how extreme weather is hitting already disadvantaged people hardest, how we can have positive conversations with those who are cautious about climate action, and what solidarity with our Pasifika and First Nations neighbours means. We will also be sharing our ideas for an advocacy strategy in the lead up to the next Federal election, to keep strong action on global warming on the agenda, regardless of who wins government.
The Faith in a better future conference will be held as a face-to-face conference (at the Centre for Ministry in Sydney) and online. The keynote talks, including Moderator Rev. Faaimata (Mata) Havea Hiliau, will be livestreamed. Then, different workshop streams will be offered for our face to face and online participants. Our hope is this will make it easier for more people to participate fully in the conference. In the same spirit of reducing barriers, there is no cost to attend.
Conference speakers and the full program will be announced as they are confirmed. You can still register here.
If you have any questions or would like more information about the Faith in a better future conference, please contact Jono Row, Church Collaboration Lead – Advocacy, Uniting at jrow@uniting.org or 0403 242 360.
