Hope

God bless people like Greta Thunberg and Autumn Peltier who have but one essential message for us grown-ups, and that is, accept the science.

It seems like one of those well-duh! moments, of course we should accept the science. Perhaps it is either stupidity or greed that makes adults ignore the science (at this point). And I suspect that it may be both.

Simply put—we are running out of time, which means that we haven’t run out of time. There is hope. I do, like many other people, what I can. I reduce, recycle and reuse. But the solutions are bigger than that, the solutions will involve every aspect of society; government, business, art and education. Oh, and faith groups too.

I think what faith groups can bring to the efforts for solutions to human-made climate change is that there is, when we all work together, reason for hope.

Hope occupies a place very close to the heart of the Judeo-Christian tradition. From the rainbow appearing in the sky after the flood to the willingness of God to take on human form in the person of Jesus Christ. We are a people of hope.

Don’t discount the value of hope. If it is one of the things we can bring to the conversation it is helpful. It is way better than being without hope. It’s hard to come up with solutions if you are feeling hopeless. Hope is the very foundation of creative solutions.

They say that necessity is the mother of invention, well then, perhaps hope is the life-partner of necessity. Either way, necessity and hope go hand in hand in the creative hearts and minds of the people of all parts of society that will reverse the negative impacts of climate change.

We are a people of hope and that is a valuable contribution to our collective efforts as a society striving for a healthy environment for everyone, thanks to Greta and Autumn.