Resolution Fourteen ...

Deletions are lined out
 Additions are in red
 
A Resolution to the ELCA Churchwide Assembly to Update the Social Statement on “Caring for Creation: Vision and Hope”

 

WHEREAS: God created the COSMOS out of love and commanded us to be stewards of it; and humans have added enough carbon dioxide and other gases to the atmosphere to affect the climate, increase the earth’s temperature, modify weather patterns and melt glaciers, which could cause the loss of fully one-third of plant and animal species and cause more storms, flooding and rising sea levels that will displace and impoverish hundreds of millions if not billions of humans, thus, failing to fulfill God’s commandment to be good stewards of the earth and harming or destroying much of the flora and fauna which God has created; and

 

WHEREAS, the Social Statement on Caring for Creation: Vision, Hope, and adopted by the ELCA in its 1993 churchwide assembly

  • Recognized our developing environmental crisis;

  • Acknowledged humanity’s separation from God and from the rest of creation as the central cause of the environmental crisis;

  • Provided a theological rationale for caring for God’s creation, including a vision of God’s intention for creation and for humanity as creation’s caregivers; and

  • Expressed hope, calling the ELCA to effective, responsive action for environmental integrity; and

 

WHEREAS: Many members of the ELCA are working to promote awareness of global warming or to correct the ravages of storms which have been strengthened by rising ocean temperatures; and

 

WHEREAS: National governments, many state governments and city governments are enacting legislation to reduce the release of carbon dioxide and other heat retaining gases; and

 

WHEREAS:  The ELCA strives to honor God’s laws but wrote its major statement on environmental policy in 1993, a document which, although it includes limited references to the effect of global warming on creation, focuses on the environmental impact of toxic pollution, and approved  another less public policy paper in 2003 discussing global warming and actions to prevent it ; and

 

WHEREAS:  We believe that it is now time for the ELCA to take an even more proactive stance on the issue of how we fulfill God’s first directive to man ;

 

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the TX-LA Gulf Coast Synod present a resolution to memorialize the 2007 Churchwide Assembly to call for a revision of the ELCA Social Statement "Caring for Creation: Vision of Hope" to develop  directing that an expanded statement of environmental policy be developed which

A.   Addresses all of man’s humanity's impacts on the environment;

B.   Encourages individuals and congregations to work with local, regional and national governments to promote sustainable environmental practices and policies;

C.   Encourages individuals and congregations seek ways to reduce environmental resource consumption by adopting an “environmental tithe,” which would include reducing energy usage and waste generation (paper, plastics, glass, ink, etc.) by at least 10%.

D.   And since encouragement is often not enough, calls for the ELCA, its offices and its churchwide staff, its schools, organizations and agencies to be models for its synods and congregations by:

1.   Working diligently to lessen its/their personal and corporate impacts on global warming (carbon footprint) by reducing the amount of carbon dioxide and other global warming gases which their actions generate;

2.   Calculating and progressively increasing their energy conservation and efficiency (i.e., by performing an energy audit), by recycling, and by evaluating their procurement policies and their resource-consumption reduction.

3.   Incorporating incentives into the Mission Investment Fund that encourage environmentally responsible design, construction and siting of new congregations and rebuilding (in the wake of natural disasters) in ways that are environmentally appropriate.

4.   Modeling environmental responsibility at all national assemblies and gatherings by recycling and conserving energy.

5.   Promoting investment by the ELCA pension funds, benevolent societies and individual members in corporations or organizations which develop alternative energy generation; for example, investments in wind energy or biogas from livestock wastes would especially help Lutheran farming communities and their communities and materially affect our need to use fossil fuels.

 

FURTHERMORE, LET IT ALSO BE RESOLVED that the TX-LA Gulf Coast Synod

1.   Encourage its individual congregations and members to become more aware of their impact on the environment, and to work with our neighbors to enhance rather than to degrade God’s creation; and

2.   Be a model for its congregations by D 1 thru D 5 above.

 

Person Submitting Resolution: Charles Sheppard, Covenant Lutheran Church, Houston, TX

 

Implications of Resolution (if adopted)

 

1.   What is the financial impact of this resolution on the synod budget?

 

This resolution does not affect the synod budget since it is a resolution for the ELCA to begin developing a biblical consistent position on our response to global warming. Obviously, developing this position paper will cost several tens of thousands of dollars and will probably come from ELCA funds or donations. However, this is a small price to pay to prevent what could happen if ELCA members do not become involved in this crisis.

 

2.   What are the personnel implications within our synod (or churchwide)? Who will be responsible for implementations of the resolution?

The church at large is likely to appoint a group to implement this resolution. Since they have many resources to draw on, such as the Presbyterian resolution, it should be fairly easy to draft the appropriate report and position paper. Broadcasting and popularizing of the eventual position will be the responsibility of all concerned active members and clergy in the ELCA.

 

3.   How does this resolution enhance and forward the mission of the church and our synod?

Taking care of God’s creation and our neighbors is the prime directive. Thus, helping ELCA members to understand the implications of global warming and how their actions influence it is a mission akin to healing the sick and feeding the hungry. In this case it directing some of our energies to preventing the future causes of poverty and disease, i.e., droughts, hurricanes or coastal flooding, is a more efficient use of our resources than responding to disasters.

 

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