Refugia Newsletter #82

Advent reflections, Massachusetts climate law, ICJ hearings, disinformation, prairie strips and sewer rat hope

Refugia News

Tomorrow, my university’s choirs will present their annual lessons and carols concert. Actually, it’s a worship service, a pull-out-the-stops banquet of music and scripture, carefully planned to explore Advent themes and prepare us for Christmas. (That bit about stops is literal—there’s a great organ in the church where the service takes place.) This year’s theme was chosen long ago, but wow, does it feel right: “Welcome All Wonders: An Apocalyptic Advent.” Not even kidding.

I usually get to read one of the scripture lessons at this service, and guess which one they assigned me this year. Yep, the scariest, most apocalypsiest one: Matthew 24, where Jesus tells the disciples, “Oh yeah, things are going to get rough—earthquakes, wars, darkened sun, false messiahs—the whole bit. And you can’t know when it’s coming.” (Not an actual quote, of course. I’m paraphrasing.)

Great. Why couldn’t I get the reading from Isaiah about the deserts rejoicing or something? Well, that’s the thing about Advent in the Christian liturgical calendar. It’s our most apocalyptic season. As I wrote in Refugia Faith, “Advent is about a clash of kingdoms.” It’s the time when we feel the tension between “‘the world in sin and error pining’ and the flourishing and just community of life we long for.” We long for the coming of the infant, and we long for the coming of God’s final redemption. So Advent is the time when we practice turning despair into preparation for the redemptive work God is doing.

That turn is why I’m grateful for those who are shifting now from post-election despair to a kind of grim determination for what’s ahead. At church a couple weeks ago, my pastor featured a poem by Caitlin Seida titled “Hope is Not a Bird, Emily, It’s a Sewer Rat.” I commend this poem to you. Never mind being lovely and fluttery. We need to be tough and resourceful.

I also commend to you this beautiful, interfaith reflection by Rev. Betsy Bennett, fitting to this season where all major religions strive to hope that “darkness cannot overcome light.” The truth will ground us, and each other, Betsy writes:

Despite our initial disorientation, we are perhaps more ready for the work ahead on behalf of our democracy and our climate than ever before. When we feel lost in the darkness of threats and lies and abuses of power, we have the light of truth to guide us — and the company of others who also bear the light of truth — to help us see clearly and support one another as we find our way.

Defend the truth, build networks, stick together, don’t shoot your allies. I’ve been reading many voices repeating those themes in the past month, in many contexts, including among faith groups. So I’m grateful for all of you. And especially grateful this week for reader Janice Young, CSJA, who gets a shout-out here for referring three friends to this newsletter. Thank you, Janice, for doing a little network-building!

Please note that after the December 21 edition of this newsletter, my next edition will not appear until January 10. I usually take a little breather at the turn of the year. I’ll remind you about this next time as well.

Highly unusual that we got our little tree up already this year. Typically we don’t get to it until after we’ve finished teaching for the fall semester. Husband Ron found the climate stripes ornament on Etsy.

This Week in Climate News

Let’s start with an example of state-level climate action, the kind we’re going to need to see a lot more of in the next four years (at least). Massachusetts just passed a major climate bill. According to an article by Carrie Klein in Canary Media:

Legislators approved a long-awaited climate bill that will limit gas pipeline expansion, make it easier to site and build renewables, and allow utilities to use geothermal energy — instead of fossil fuels — to heat and cool homes. Governor Maura Healey, a Democrat, is expected to sign it into law in the coming days.

Which she in fact did on November 21. While the bill covers a lot of ground and has been in process for a long time, the timing of its passage is most welcome. Klein notes:

Massachusetts is the first state to take action on climate since Trump’s re-election; the new federal landscape could spur more state lawmakers to try and advance climate legislation.

Well, let’s hope so.

[Note: Some bold type here in the above quotes is original, some added.]

In more state-level good news, solar installations did grow rapidly again in 2024 in the US, including in some surprising states—i.e., red states that had very little before. As John Fitzgerald Weaver of PV Magazine reports:

Solar power electricity generation in the U.S. increased 17.5% in 2023 compared to 2022, accounting for 5.5% of all electricity. The momentum has continued in 2024, with solar up 22.5% year-over-year as of September, reaching 6.63% of all electricity over the past twelve months. Within this national growth, 15 states saw their solar generation increase by more than 50%, with many of these states having historically lagged in solar development.

Usually when I share news stories with you, I try to wait until they’re “ripe”—that is, something has actually happened or been decided or become operational. But sometimes stories are important enough to write about while still in process. Such is the case—I think, I hope—with this landmark case now before the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands. Image credit: Dennis G. Jarvis via Wikimedia Commons

Here’s how Karen Zraick of the New York Times sums up what’s happening:

The most important climate case that a lot of people haven’t heard about is playing out this week and next at the International Court of Justice.

The court, based in The Hague, adjudicates disputes between nations and issues advisory opinions on big international legal issues. In this case, the judges have been asked by the United Nations to weigh in on what, exactly, international law requires states to do about climate change, and what should be the consequences for states that harm the climate through actions or omissions.

Representatives from more than 100 countries and organizations are appearing at the court, hoping to influence that opinion.

Do the big carbon emitters, historically and presently, have legal obligations for the damages caused to other countries? That’s the basic question here. The case arose because in March of 2023, the UN General Assembly agreed by consensus to ask the ICJ to come up with an answer to that question in what is called an “advisory opinion.” The ICJ is charged with considering all of current international law as well as a huge range of testimony in developing this opinion.

Some interesting things about this:

• The case has been developing for years, driven by law students in Pacific Island states, who are extremely vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.

• It’s the largest ICJ case ever.

• States (i.e., nations) are weighing in on the case through written submissions and oral arguments.

• On the oral arguments, as Isabella Kaminski writes in this excellent article in Drilled: “The U.S. will only be one of dozens of states that gets to make its case at The Hague next week; each gets the same thirty minutes regardless of population or land mass.”

• You can watch videos of the hearings.

Testimony continues through December 13, and the ICJ will issue its opinion next year. What could happen? Well, advisory opinions from the ICJ are not binding, but they are influential indeed. Zraick writes that the opinion “could bolster the case for linking human rights and climate change in international legal proceedings, and potentially open the floodgates to more climate litigation around the world.”

The whole point of this process is to provide a clear framework for legal cases around the globe. The fact that vulnerable nations are getting a full hearing is a big deal. Since neither individual countries’ legislatures nor COP negotiations based on UN treaties like the Paris Agreement have moved us far enough in addressing the needs of the most vulnerable nations, an authoritative statement on international law is another strategy for prompting action—and getting around the influence of huge emitters and fossil fuel-driven interests.

For more wonky details, I recommend this article in Drilled as well as this interview in Carbon Brief with an international law scholar.

Finally, if you are sad, mad, or anxious about how people of faith voted in the US election, please read this lovely piece by James Bruggers for Inside Climate News, featuring some inspiring faith leaders who are outspoken and effective on climate issues. Bruggers quotes mainline, evangelical, and Catholic Christians as well as Jewish and indigenous leaders, among others. Meanwhile, here’s a short article about another round of divestment pledges from faith groups around the world, in conjunction with the faith witness at COP29.

More of that “create networks, stick together” theme going on here. Good.

Deeper Dive

You might have noticed that I typically cite the author and source of my quotations and references, and I always link to my sources. That’s because I want to honor the work of climate journalists and reinforce the idea that reliable sources are crucial—I preach this with my students and I try to practice it as well. Maybe you, too, have been thinking a lot lately about lies and mis/disinformation. Nothing makes me madder, I think. Disinformation is an act of power—it’s insidious and monumentally influential, it’s getting worse, and we have to face it.

Moreover, this is an international problem. Which is why several countries are combining efforts to combat mis- and disinformation systems. This has been brewing for a while, but this week, as Justine Calma of The Verge reports:

Brazil and the United Nations launched a new international effort to combat disinformation on climate change. They announced the Global Initiative for Information Integrity on Climate Change during the G20 Leaders’ Summit taking place in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

It’s a collaboration between governments and international organizations to boost research on misinformation swirling online and around the globe that they fear could slow action on climate change. There isn’t much information available yet, but they say they’ll fund nonprofit efforts to counter that spread of lies.

Here’s the website of the initiative. So far, from what I can tell, the plan amounts to pooling money to fund research. But hey, it’s a start.

You can actually read the report on disinformation prepared for this year’s COP by the international Climate Action Against Disinformation coalition.

The report makes for fascinating, disheartening, and unsurprising reading. The focus is on understanding the big players and systems that push disinformation. Thankfully, the main report concludes with a section called “This Is Not an Unsolvable Problem.” However, they warn:

We cannot fix this issue through better storytelling alone, or by pushing more scientific data and fact-checks into the world. Research has continually shown that disinformation wins outs, because such content helps drive the attention economy and systems optimised for engagement. Platforms need to curtail the impact of superspreaders and make it harder, more labour intensive and less profitable to ‘go viral’ by lying about the climate crisis. If we do not address that core, architectural problem, the rest will struggle to achieve real change.

One of my students recommended to me some “video essayists” on YouTube, a genre I find rather promising. I poked around on the YouTube channel of one of the people he recommended, and found this video called Climate Denial: A Measured Response.

Look, some of it is kooky and silly—that’s part of this genre. The dude is just a guy from the UK (his real name is Harry Brewis), but he offers a pretty valid analysis, stuffed with examples and references, of why people fall for climate denialism. I keep thinking about one of his main themes: climate-denying influencers use a pantomime of rationality to sell their brand.

Their main job is to make people feel that the opinions they already have are reasonable, rational, and supported by evidence. This gives people the irresistible charge of feeling very right about what they already think. But unfortunately, the “evidence” given is nonsensical, deceptive, or only a very small piece of a big picture. Sigh. I refer you again to Genevieve Guenther’s very helpful book on climate propaganda, worth reading to help equip us all to fight mis- and disinformation with greater confidence.

Refugia Sightings

Let’s turn now from that dispiriting dive into the world of disinformation and move on to some nifty conservation wins.

First: prairie strips! I’ve written before about prairie potholes, wherein farmers restore little pockets of wetland amid their fields in order to better manage rainfall and flooding. Prairie strips serve similar purposes. By restoring only ten percent of a row crop field to native prairie, farmers can reap huge “disproportional benefits” like reducing soil retention by 95%, reducing phosphorous and nitrogen runoff by 80 to 95%, boosting biodiversity, managing heavy rain, and cleaning up water in the regional watershed.

The idea is based on research at Iowa State University. The term prairie strips, amusingly, is actually an acronym: “Science-based Trails of Rowcrops Integrated with Prairie Strips.” Love that. The trick is to position the strips strategically so that the native plants, with their deep, dense root systems, catch runoff and preserve soil health. Farmers appreciate that their fields are still producing plenty of soy and corn. Here’s a video explaining the research and featuring farmers happy with this win-win solution. (Thanks to reader and friend Lee Hardy for sending me this story.)

My second nifty conservation win today also concerns native plants. Why not let them grow in cemeteries? Apparently, some cemetery operators have been experimenting with converting some of their turf grass to native meadows. People don’t always love this idea, admittedly, but during the pandemic, people began appreciating cemeteries as places of outdoor refuge, and that helped encourage some communities to be more open to cemeteries as wilder spaces.

Caption and image from the New York Times: “Joseph Charap in a wildflower meadow in Green-Wood Cemetery. Credit: Bing Guan for The New York Times.”

The advantages of meadow areas in cemeteries are more than aesthetic. Cara Buckley of the New York Times writes:

Lawn mowers are loud, often polluting and heavy, compacting soil and hastening erosion. Thirsty turf grass fares poorly during the droughts that are growing longer and more intense. There is also mounting awareness of the harms from pesticides and irrigation, and a growing recognition that greener practices can help wildlife while making a cemetery more resilient to a changing climate.

Green burials are getting more popular, too, Buckley writes. My own father-in-law was buried with a green burial last summer. The site bordered a wild hedge of shrubs, but the actual burial area was mowed, unfortunately, even if the grass wasn’t the carefully manicured turf kind. My mother-in-law and I really wanted to plant a bunch of native flowers on Dad’s grave, but anything that grew would have gotten mowed over. Maybe someday, the cemetery will welcome our scheme?

Media Corner

Two podcast episodes to recommend to you this week.

First, an episode of the BTS podcast Climate Changed called “The Bible and Climate Change.” This episode combines a bunch of my favorite faith/climate people from different contexts and stirs them together into a delightful brew: Ben Yosua-Davis, Derrick Weston, Peterson Toscano, and Kyle Meyaard-Schaap. Kyle, the author of Following Jesus in a Warming World, is the featured guest interviewed, and Kyle is unfailingly clear, inspiring, and encouraging. Peterson steers the conversation with Kyle, and then Ben and Derrick have their own conversation reflecting on Kyle’s interview. There’s a lot of fun trading favorite earth-focused scripture pasages, and so much good insight—please do check it out.

Next, an episode of Biologos’s Language of God podcast. This one features behind-the-scenes coverage of COP29 with two more of my favorite climate/faith people: Colin Hoogerwerf and Jim Stump. To find this bonus episode, “Live from COP29,” find the Language of God podcast on your podcast app and you’ll see the episode.

Colin tells me that he has an article coming out next week with more about what he and Jim observed at COP, especially as they interacted with faith leaders there. I’ll link to that article next time. Meanwhile, though, Colin gave me permission to share with you two quotations from climate activists he interviewed. Exclusive content!

Colin asked his interviewees to share with him about climate effects in their communities. And he asked what message they wanted to convey to Christians in the US. Here are two excerpts (edited for clarity) from what they said.

From Dorcas Wakia of Kenya:

I think [US Christians] need to come and see for themselves…. We have gone to climate strikes. We are here chanting, “climate justice, climate justice.” … We need to hold leaders accountable. The most greenhouse [gas] emitters, they need to pay for what they have done. But if there’s still a large number of people who don’t believe it’s happening, … they need to come and see, or they need to just support the already existing projects that are working towards reduction of greenhouse gas emissions.

From Litara leremia-llan of Samoa:

I think it’s a challenge to all those who follow God or follow a higher power. There is something in you that goes off in your gut when you are moved by something. And I would just want to encourage anybody who’s listening that God has given you a sense of justice. And so could I maybe ask, Why is this so not personal to you? Why is it not a sense of wanting to do right by another? If you proclaim that you follow a higher power, could it be that you’re not connected? Could it be that you’re not educated enough in it? My challenge would be to make it personal to you if you feel removed, read about it, watch a video, visit the place, see it firsthand, and I guarantee you your gut will tell you that there’s something wrong. So sometimes a lack of compassion comes from a lack of of exposure. So expose yourself to what we’re facing.

Thank you to Colin and to these two women for allowing these words to be heard.

Finally, a gentle reminder that a copy of Refugia Faith makes a great holiday gift.

May the next few weeks bring a sense of peace, some time for contemplation, and many small, encouraging delights.

Till next time, be well.

[Bold type in quotations is added unless otherwise indicated.]