CHRISTIAN groups got here together last Saturday to host a service of “prayer and lament for creation” on the Immaculate Conception, Farm Street, London, before joining greater than 60,000 people on a march through London to protest against the drastic decline of the wildlife within the UK, and damage to the ecosystem.
The Restore Nature Now march was organised by a coalition of environmental organisations: Extinction Rebellion was joined by among the biggest nature charities within the UK, including the RSPB, the Wildlife Trusts, the Climate Coalition, WWF UK, the National Trust, WWT, Woodland Trust, Wildlife and Countryside Link, and Rewilding Britain.
The service, named “Creation Cries Out”, was co-led by Fr Dominic Robinson SJ, a parish priest of the Immaculate Conception, who chairs the diocese of Westminster Justice and Peace Commission, along with the Revd Helen Burnett, an Extinction Rebellion member and Vicar of St Peter and St Paul’s in Chaldon, Southwark.
Ms Burnett explained that the service was devised to cater for individuals who wouldn’t normally go on a march, “where they’ll pray together and ground themselves”. It was essential for the gathering to bring together Christians from diverse denominations, she said, because “over creation there could be nothing apart from common ground”.
In a sermon, Andy Atkins, the CEO of A Rocha UK, the longest-running Christian conservation charity, said that Christians had a double mandate to guard creation: to steward God’s beloved creatures; and to take care of the vulnerable in society, who were essentially the most affected by environmental injustices, each globally and here within the UK.
The 2023 State of Nature Report reckoned that one in six species in Great Britain are liable to becoming extinct, and that just about 1500 species, from the turtledove to the water vole, could disappear entirely. This would come with 43 per cent of bird species, 31 per cent of amphibians and reptiles, and 26 per cent of land mammals.
The report also found that, of Britain’s most significant habitats for wildlife, just one in seven were in good condition. In January, the Office for Environmental Protection, the independent watchdog, found that the Government is on target to satisfy only 4 out of 40 environmental targets for England.
“None of the parties have enough about this of their manifestos,” said Hannah Eves, a co-organiser of the Creation Cries Out service, from A Rocha UK. “In the run-up to the election, we want politicians to take a seat up and take notice that a lot of the British public cares so deeply about nature.”
The march had five demands for the subsequent Government: to double the budget for nature and climate-friendly farming; to make polluters pay for nature and climate recovery; to guard more land and water for wildlife; an Environmental Rights Bill to ensure access to wash air and green spaces for all residents; and to at the least halve UK greenhouse gas emissions by 2030.
Safeguarding the integrity of creation is one in all the Five Marks of Mission for the Anglican Church. Many of the Christian participants within the march felt that churches could do more to guard and restore nature. Fr Robinson said that environmental groups, churches, and other faith groups could share advice for making their buildings more sustainable and increasing the biodiversity on their land, in addition to praying and campaigning together.
Ruth Jarman, from Green Christian, said: “If we actually understood what we are saying every Sunday, that God created the heavens and the earth, and that it has been given to us to take care of, we could be living in a really different way.
“The Bible could be very clear about how we should always be living — our treasure ought to be in heaven, not on earth. We shouldn’t be specializing in wealth and possessions and economic growth. Economic growth is the god of our time. If everybody of religion only saw that, this might be a really different world, and we might not be trashing it the way in which that we’re.”
