Making Our Voices Heard
Written by Ellen Van Velsor > May 18, 2022
Many people don’t associate advocacy with church membership. I’ve been a United Methodist all my life and I didn’t always make this connection. Of course, Methodists have long been known for taking an active stance in society worldwide. Our mission work is rooted in that Wesleyan commitment.
“The United Methodist Church believes God's love for the world is an active and engaged love, a love seeking justice and liberty. We cannot just be observers. So we care enough about people's lives to risk interpreting God's love, to take a stand, to call each of us into a response, no matter how controversial or complex. The church helps us think and act out a faith perspective, not just responding to all the other 'mind-makers-up' that exist in our society." (https://www.umc.org/en/what-we-believe/basics-of-our-faith/our-social-positions)
But until recently, I had not linked my beliefs in our call to creation care and justice to my opportunities for advocacy, which I saw solely as my secular work. In fact, the church has been way ahead of me! The United Women in Faith (formerly UMW) have been involved in creation care and justice work for a number of years and more recently, an even more widespread creation justice movement is growing within the United Methodist Church.
“…..in an age of widespread social and environmental degradation threatening human and planetary wellbeing, many United Methodists are asking with renewed urgency what more we are called to do in faithfulness to God to care for creation and do justice with our neighbors. The interconnected crises of rising CO2 emissions, climate chaos, biodiversity collapse, land, water, and air pollution, and multiple forms of social inequity, including especially systemic racism, economic injustice, and intergenerational violence, require widespread change at every level of personal, social, cultural, economic, and political life today. The United Methodist Creation Justice Movement has emerged in this kairos time of urgency, crisis, and opportunity to join our many faithful responses together through the power of collective, connectional action.” (https://umcreationjustice.org/)
Advocating for policy changes at the federal, state, and local levels is one important way we can respond to this call. Many of our elected officials are UMC members and many more live their lives from various other faith-based perspectives. It is worth our time to call out the need for policies that do more to “care for creation and do justice with our neighbors”.
Fortunately, the United Women in Faith and the Creation Justice Movement make this easy. This website (https://umcreationjustice.org/), connects to a link that allows individuals to “Tell Congress to Act Now on Climate Justice”. There are summaries of various Congressional bills and actions being discussed and a link to use to send Congress a faith-based message to take climate action now.
So, have a look at this opportunity for advocacy and check back often for updates. It is another great way to learn more about creation justice and to support faith-based change!