(PNS)— Some Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) partners who traveled to the United Nations Climate Change Conference are reacting to an agreement reached by world leaders and reflecting on their time spent there.
After two weeks of meetings, world leaders finally reached a climate agreement known as the Glasgow Climate Pact, the “first U.N. climate deal to explicitly mention the need to move away from coal power and subsidies for fossil fuels,” according to the Washington Post.
The pact has drawn criticism from various activists and leaders, at least partly due to last-minute maneuvering by China and India that weakened language on phasing out fossil fuels, the Post noted.
“I had hoped for more,” said Burkhard Paetzold, a retired mission co-worker for Presbyterian World Mission who was a Presbyterians for Earth Care (PEC) representative at the conference, known as COP26. “Many good drafts had been watered down at the last minute to the lowest common denominator due to the consensus principle.”
The Rev. Bill Somplatsky-Jarman, another retired PC(USA) staff member, made similar comments. “While everyone had high hopes for COP26, the results were disappointing. … While we are bringing the temperature projections downward, we have a lot more to do.”
However, he applauded “new commitments on methane leakages” and noted that “an end to subsidies for coal are important, even if the language on ‘phasing out’ coal was watered down.” Furthermore, “the agreement between China and the U.S. to cooperate on carbon reduction are all positives as we move forward,” he said.
Optimism also was expressed by the Rev. Fred Milligan, a PC(USA) minister member of the Presbytery of Philadelphia who is serving with the Church of Scotland in Glasgow.
“My general reaction to the pact is hopeful,” said Milligan, a PEC representative. “It isn’t the bold document we in the religious sector were hoping for, but it was clear, in the end, that the only holdouts were China and India (and maybe Iran and Saudi Arabia). Granted, these include two of the largest emitters of greenhouse gasses, but they still went along (albeit with reservations and modifications) with the final wording on coal and fossil fuel subsidies as well as so many other elements which we in the ecumenical Christian sector, as well as others, had advocated.”
Milligan went on to note, “Perhaps the most hopeful signals about the future possibilities for progress were the pact announced by the U.S. and China during the second week of the COP26 and the information that over $38 trillion (USD) of investments have been pulled out of fossil fuels since 2009, making it more and more difficult for that industry to receive financing for new projects.”
Normally, staff from the Compassion, Peace & Justice ministries would have journeyed to COP26. But with travel restrictions still in place due to the pandemic, the Presbyterian Hunger Program and the Presbyterian Ministry at the United Nations worked to keep the church updated on COP26 happenings through social media and blog posts and stayed in close contact with partners. Those in attendance along with Paetzold, Somplatsky-Jarman [representing PC(USA)], and Milligan included the Rev. Dr. Neddy Astudillo, a PHP advisory committee member and Red Latina co-founder who attended in her capacity as a GreenFaith staff person and as a PEC representative. (Listen to comments by Astudillo about COP26 here.)
