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Love Reaches Out to Address our Climate Crisis

General Assembly 2014 Event 426

This event is scheduled to occur on Saturday, June 28, 2014; 12:30 - 1:45 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, in Rhode Island Convention Center Room 554.

Program Description

Program goals: This program will review the science, discuss the grief associated with Climate Change, and address how communities are and will be affected by the effects of Climate Change. Actions to take and the many ways that individual congregations can address this in their congregations and larger communities will be explored.

Climate Change and all of its implications is not an easy topic to hear or talk about. We all must come to terms with our negative feelings such as grief and powerlessness so we can move on to positive action. Love can reach out in compassion around people’s feelings of overwhelm, anxiety and despair to then move them on to acceptance, creativity and action. The goal of this program is to galvanize congregations and individual Unitarian Universalists (UUs) into taking action, including collaborating with other congregations, as well as interfaith coalitions and secular community and national organizations, in addressing the Climate Crisis. Ethically and morally—our principles as a faith group compel us to take action.

This program will describe how the climate crisis is affecting and will greatly affect our communities. It will address the grief inherent in accepting the truth of Climate Change and will encourage congregations to reach out and be a source of information and action as we move forward in addressing this global crisis together. Every segment of society will be directly affected and we will encourage congregations to reach out to all members of their greater community to prepare, to respond to those most severely affected including economically and ethnically marginalized populations and to work together to urge policy changes from our political and cultural leadership.

We will describe the science and the sequence of climate events that indicate we, as a collective people here on earth, have forgotten our interconnectedness to Nature. With Reaching Out in Love, with Justice as our goal, we will reach those we may currently think unreachable. If we are to solve this global crisis, ALL of us will be needed, ALL will have a role to play as we move forward to a more loving, caring greater community.

The presenters have all been trained to present the Climate Reality Project’s PowerPoint presentation. Our training occurred over 3 days July 30-August 1, 2013, in Chicago and contains material gathered and researched by former Vice President Al Gore, who also personally trained the presenters along with 1,300 individuals from 70 countries around the world. Some of our presenters have since made presentations at community and congregational events. The Climate Reality Project’s Leadership Corps has an extensive network established in every state in the U.S. and several groups established on Facebook for support, guidance and the sharing of ideas. Globally, there are 7,000 Climate Leaders trained to present this material.

Presenters

  • Gail Koelln, Unitarian Congregation at Shelter Rock, NY
  • Sandi Smith-Gill, Unitarian Universalist Congregation of Frederick, MD
  • Rev. Dr. Nina D. Grey, Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Bozeman, MT
  • Monica Jenkins, Unitarian Universalist Society of Geneva, IL
  • Rev. Wendy Bell, Harvard Unitarian Universalist Church of Harvard, MA
  • Assoc. Prof. Mike Hogue, Meadville-Lombard Theological School, Chicago, IL

Handouts

Audio recordings of General Assembly (GA) programs are available for purchase. Every GA 2014 registrant has access to all of the 2014 audio content at no charge.