Climate change is making in-roads into the world religions, reaching a large and potentially crucial global audience. Since it has a unique capacity to inspire and motivate lifestyle change, religion could be invaluable in building a more sustainable future.

All of the major religions include the environment in their traditions or sacred texts, to one degree or another. It is taking some longer than others to connect these ancient truths to current affairs, but the trend is in the right direction.

Here are just a few of the initiatives underway:

Buddhism

Living in harmony with nature is one of the basic tenets of Buddhism. There is a real awareness that we as human beings are part of the ecosystem, and do not have the right to exploit the earth or its creatures.

One contemporary expression of this belief is Singapore's Po Ern Shi Temple complex, built along sustainable lines. The large site is currently being rebuilt, and will be home to a temple with a capacity of 2,500, along with accommodation for a monastery. The temple features solar panels and solar hot water systems, natural ventilation, and solatubes to make use of natural light. A number of experiments are going on at the site too, including an innovative micro-hydro power system that will generate electricity from rain water falling from the roof to the basement.

Around the temple, rainwater will be used to irrigate the landscaped gardens. Herbs for the vegetarian kitchens will be grown on site. The gardens have been designed to help Singapore's depleted butterfly population. Plants have been specially selected as host plants for eggs and caterpillars, or nectar plants for adult butterflies.

"My generation destroyed the environment," temple president Boon Siong told Celsias editor Chris Tobias on a visit to the site last year. "Now its time for [the younger generation] to save it.  We must now help our children and grandchildren restore the earth back to health by educating them how we can do it."

Islam

In Islamic teaching, the earth is a perfect gift from Allah, created by him for humankind. When it is abused, this is taken as an insult to God's craftsmanship, and an act of ingratitude towards God. Instead, there should be reverence and appreciation for the earth and its creatures.

The Quran teaches that humankind has been appointed "guardians in the earth", giving us a responsibility of stewardship, known as ‘Amana'. Another factor is unity, with Muslims worldwide concerned for areas where other Muslims are in danger. In the case of climate change, solidarity with Bangladesh has been important.

The UK has an Islamic environmental movement, based around the study centre the Islamic Foundation for Ecology and Environmental Sciences, and the UK's first environmental campaign group, the London Islamic Network for the Environment. The latter is the only Islamic campaign group in the world, so the movement is still in its infancy, but their campaign to raise awareness of climate change is gently building momentum.

It may take a giant leap forward with a major new mosque planned for London that is being designed with Islamic sustainable principles at every level of the design. The Abbey Mills Islamic centre will be a futuristic mosque, built as part of the Olympic 2012 regeneration efforts. "The scheme is organized as an Islamic Garden, transposed onto modern day London" promise the architects. It "is intended to be a prototype for sustainability and will incorporate wind turbine minarets, tidal power, CHP and photovoltaic technology."

Judaism

The Torah gives a firm foundation for a Jewish approach to the environment, with the law of Moses incorporating a many aspects of stewardship, including a mandate to preserve the land for future generations. Later writings have reinforced these ideas, with this Rabbinic quote from Midrash Kohelet Rabbah summing up the sense of being ‘shomrai adamah', protectors of the earth appointed by a creator God:

"When God created the first human beings, God led them around the Garden of Eden and said: "Look at my works! See how beautiful they are-how excellent! For your sake I created them all. See to it that you do not spoil and destroy my world; for if you do, there will be no one else to repair it." (Midrash Kohelet Rabbah, 1 on Ecclesiastes 7:13)

Putting this into practice, the Union for Reform Judaism (URJ) launched a web portal on Jewish environmentalism in January, with extensive resources on the theory and practice of a greener Judaism. "Climate change is the crisis of our time and we must confront this challenge in our individual and communal lives," said Rabbi Marla Feldman of URJ. "While many of us have already begun to take steps, much work remains to be done to assist our congregations in managing their synagogue facilities and developing the mechanisms and resources to face environmental challenges."

Christianity

The Christian environmental movement is also gathering pace, and received a boost with a special edition of the Bible last year. The ‘Green Bible' highlights the Bible's teachings on the environment. The introduction of my promotional copy is by Dave Bookless, director of Christian conservation agency Arocha UK. He points out that the most quoted verse of the Bible, John 3:16, has the earth (kosmos) in the middle of it - "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son..."

In traditional Christian teaching, the earth is not only God's creation, but is loved by God. For some reason, many Christians vehemently defend the former and forget the latter, but as I've written about on Celsias before, there are many points of synergy for Christianity and environmentalism.

Nevertheless, many Christians are active in simple living, conservation, and climate change campaigning. Operation Noah is the first Christian climate change campaign in the UK, and recently launched its ‘Ark Campaign'. In the US, evangelical leaders have buried their differences to call for action. Others have drawn up ‘climate risk profiles' for companies, enabling investors to make ethical decisions. Eco-Congregation encourages churches to think through their lifestyles as individuals and as community, and one US church has taken it one step further in building a ‘green sanctuary'.

It may be premature to say that religion has finally come on board with climate change. Islam is making small steps. Hindus have not really started, even though Hindu spirituality believes that all life is sacred and interconnected. The Christian church has made the most progress, but many remain staunchly opposed, and others have simply added climate change to a basket of ‘issues' that matter. There's a long way to go, but overall, I'm optimistic that the religions are waking up to their responsibility on climate change.

Related Reading:
The Green Pope
The Bible, The Church, and the End of the World

Image Credits:
Chris Tobias
Seir via flickr
Will Palmer via flickr
Bakar 88 via flickr