Church response to climate crisis?

After breakfast and another slow motion start to the day, we decided to take a picnic lunch with us and follow the river Aeron up the wooded valley which climbs gently out of the town into the hills. It's possible to go this way to the Llanerchaeron National Trust owned 18th century manor house, with its superb collection of apple tree varietals, which we visited last eight years ago. Clare booked us on-line to go by car for a visit tomorrow, but we didn't think we could manage to walk there and back and do justice to a tour as well, so today we walked.

The first stretch out of the village has a tarmacked path, and is beautifully managed with seats and picnic tables. Then there's a longer slightly wilder stretch, with a gravel path, labelled 'Public Amenity Site. This was donated to Aberaeron Council by a local landowner forty years ago. The woodland river banks are reserved for fishing. Where the valley widens into meadows, these are still used for grazing and the path for cyclists and walkers is fenced in. We walked four and a half kilometres before stopping for lunch, and returning. Lovely, every step of the way. Yesterday's walk was more energetic. Today's was more on the flat but we both felt quite tired and were glad of a siesta on return.

After tea, we went down to the north beach. As it was mild and sunny, albeit cloudy, Clare was determined to go in for a swim, which she did, very briefly, giving her a pleasant sense of achievement. I cooked supper for us, and then we walked to the beach again to see the sun setting, although what we saw was no more than a long band of coloured cloud above the horizon. But we made the effort.

I received a message this afternoon to say that next Sunday's Eucharist is designated 'Climate Sunday' as part of an ecumenical gesture of concern/solidarity before the global conference on climate change to be held in Glasgow in September. Yesterday I drafted a sermon on the Trinity 5 readings, today I have to start again with a different set of readings. My first reaction towards the Church in Wales leadership is 'What took you so long?' The last ten years has seen church officers appointed to address environmental issues, but development has been rather slow, perhaps too demanding, when having to cope with the catastrophic decline in church membership. 

It's over thirty years since my eco-concerns first found expression in preaching. Often it felt like my words fell on deaf ears. I'd love to see the church move beyond the aspirational and inspirational approach to climate change to some serious data gathering about the total carbon footprint of all church activity, and facing the question of how much it's necessary to be surrender to make a real measurable contribution to carbon reduction. Nobody likes to see churches closed, but are we ready to consider carbon footprint as a major factor, when the church balance sheet usually dictates whether a place stays open or closes? I think that only determined radical action, and maybe sacrificing many more churches than we're comfortable with is ever going to look like a credible response and witness in the face of crisis by churches. We had to do it to curb the pandemic, but to save the planet?