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Juicy Ecumenism – The Institute on Religion & Democracy's Blog

Juicy Ecumenism – The Institute on Religion & Democracy's Blog

Tag Archives: divestment

Religiously Divesting From Fossil Fuels

12 Friday Jul 2013

Posted by marktooley in News

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

divestment, fossil fuels, Global Warming, Mark Tooley, United Church of Christ

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Photo: Creative Commons (Ebenezer United Church of Christ, New Tripoli, PA)

By Mark Tooley

The United Church of Christ reconfirms its trendy bona fides.

Although America’s arguably most liberal Protestant denomination and consequently likely fastest declining, the United Church of Christ is not very concerned about evangelism. Instead, the UCC, or at least its elites, is always searching for a new leftist cause to animate the true believers in progressive religion. At their recent General Synod, the distant descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers targeted the Devil’s great tool for subverting the planet: fossil fuels.

“The realities of climate change require prophetic and strategic action by people of faith seeking to be faithful to the everlasting covenant God has made with us, with every living creature and with all future generations,” intoned a summary of the resolution, which originated in Massachusetts. “If fossil fuel companies simply fulfill their purpose the earth will become inhospitable to life as we know it.”

Terrified of Global Warming, like the witch-hunts of old, the solemn assembly of often rainbow clad divines resolved to divest church pension funds from oil, gas, and coal, with some caveats lest it become too inconvenient or costly. But they achieved their purpose of becoming the first major U.S. denomination to reject at least in theory profits from ravaging the earth.

“This resolution becomes a model for all faith communities who care about God’s creation and recognize the urgent scientific mandate to keep at least 80 percent of the known oil, gas and coal reserves in the ground,” explained the measure’s proponent. “This vote expresses our commitment to the future. By this vote, we are amplifying our conviction with our money.”

By 2013 the denomination is now pledged to divest from fossil fuels by 2018, except for firms that are environmentally “best in class,” which the resolution’s proponent called a likely “oxymoron,” since such firms are evidently inherently evil.

Still retaining some memory of old time Puritan self-abnegation, a spokesman for the church’s pensions board extolled the mandated “difficult changes to the way we live each day of our lives,” which will demand time, money and care — but “Creation deserves nothing less from us.” The pensions board pledged to implement these sacrifices, to the extent their fiduciary responsibilities allow.

Apparently there was not total consensus on fossil fuel divestment. Some delegates, evidently lacking the spiritual discernment to envision the new fuel-less nirvana, asked about the economic impact on states reliant on the fossil fuel industry. “Let’s talk real divestment here,” an Iowa delegate exclaimed. “Divest yourself of your airline tickets and find a non-carbon way to go home.”

Likely few took the advice. Decrying fossil fuels is typically the hobby of the wealthy and comfortable, who fantasize of a world where everybody drives a Prius and has designer solar panels. Like other shrinking old line Protestant denominations, the UCC, despite its advertised aspirations of “extravagant welcome,” is an almost all white, mostly upper middle class set that is rooted strongly in New England.

Pillorying the oil companies is easy fare for this crowd, which is mostly insulated from the gritty realities of economic survival. “That’s right — we’re essentially asking them to walk away from $20 trillion in resources,” boasted one UCC cleric about oil companies. “The only power we have in this challenge is the moral, spiritual power to revoke the social licenses of these companies to continue to profit from wrecking the earth,” she surmised. “The question is — will we exercise that power?”

While demanding that oil companies keep 80 percent of fossil fuel resources untouched, the UCC resolution’s supportive explanation, citing “extreme weather events like Hurricane Sandy and the drought, wildfires, and floods that preceded it,” temperately insists: “The CEOs at fossil fuel companies are the radicals.” So there!

Of course, the UCC stance and its supporters don’t admit that global temperatures haven’t risen in 16 years, which might slightly deflate their crisis rhetoric demanding the global economy shut down lest the planet boil.

The world, thanks to improving retrieval technology, now faces an unprecedented future of fossil fuel plenty. Oil’s discovery and development in the 19th century increased the material living standards of humanity as nothing had in all the previous millennia combined. How ironic that the fossilized detritus of long dead living organisms, manifested in oil and gas, along with otherwise useless rocks like coal, should enable the miraculous wonders of prosperity and comfort for billions of otherwise impoverished people.

New discoveries and improved harvesting of fossil fuels ultimately will enable hundreds of millions more who now hover at subsistence levels to have electricity, refrigeration, reliable heat and cooling, and safer transportation, almond with healthier, longer lives for themselves and their children.

The UCC’s hardy pioneer ancestors who hacked a great civilization out of New England‘s howling wilderness would hail the miracles of fossil fuels as divine beneficence. But their descendants instead scowl. It’s hard work being a liberal Protestant, maintaining empty old churches, and always hunting for a new cause. But God’s Kingdom and common sense will move ahead with or without the UCC and its fossil fuel preoccupations.

This article originally appeared on The American Spectator and was reposted with permission.

Anti-Israel Christians Stir Further Controversy

09 Friday Nov 2012

Posted by Institute on Religion and Democracy in News

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Christians, divestment, Episcopal, Israel, Katharine Jefferts Schori, Mark Tooley, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)

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By Mark Tooley

The October 4 ecumenical letter to the U.S. Congress from 15 mostly old-line Protestant bureaucrats warning against U.S. military aid for Israel absent “immediate investigation” of Israeli human rights abuses continues to stir controversy. The letter from United Methodist, Presbyterian Church (USA), Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and other clerics of course was uninterested in any potential human rights abuses by the Palestinian recipients of U.S. aid. Seven major U.S. Jewish groups cancelled an October scheduled interfaith dialogue with these denominations in protest.  The Jimmy Carter Center has since endorsed the ecumenical anti-Israel appeal, naturally.  And anti-Israel Episcopalians are imploring their denomination’s Presiding Bishop, who notably declined to sign the appeal, to reconsider.

Episcopalians for Mideast Peace has organized an online petition whose “target” is Presiding Bishop Katherine Jefferts Schori, who also publicly opposed anti-Israel divestment earlier this year before her General Convention was scheduled to debate it.  Divestment was overwhelmingly rejected in July, and doubtless anti-Israel Episcopalians were further peeved when her name or any other senior Episcopal leader failed to appear on the letter against U.S. military aid for Israel.  The online petition urges Jefferts Schori to “take a stand for justice for the Palestinians by adding her signature to the letter to Congress.”

Read the rest at Frontpage Magazine.

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Leftist Christians vs. the Jewish State

11 Thursday Oct 2012

Posted by Institute on Religion and Democracy in News

≈ 4 Comments

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Christian, divestment, Evangelical Lutheran Church, Israel, Mark Tooley, Maryknoll Order of the Catholic Left, Mennonites, Palestine, the American Baptist Church, the Presbyterian Church (USA), the Quakers, the United Church of Christ, United Methodist Church

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By Mark Tooley

As much of the Middle East tilts towards or implodes into Islamist rule, the ever feckless Religious Left in America has organized an ecumenical appeal asking the U.S. Congress to reduce U.S. aid for Israel.  After all, it is pro-America, democratic Israel that is the primary threat to peace and stability in the Middle East.

Of course, the church potentates opened their recent letter to Congress with the usual claim to evenhanded neutrality. “We recognize that each party—Israeli and Palestinian—bears responsibilities for its actions and we therefore continue to stand against all violence regardless of its source,” they supinely insisted. How nice. But of course their only policy recommendation is to punish Israel.

Read more here.

38.895111 -77.036365

Quakers Divest from Israel

27 Thursday Sep 2012

Posted by Institute on Religion and Democracy in Uncategorized

≈ 3 Comments

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divestment, Hewlett-Packard, Institute on Religion and Democracy, IRD Blog, Israel, Mark Tooley, Middle East, Quakers, Quakers Friends Fiduciary Corporat

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By Mark Tooley 

Hold the presses!  The Quakers are divesting from firms doing business with Israel. Maybe the famed smile of the Quaker Oats Man should now turn to a frown. Specifically the Quaker Friends Fiduciary Corporation (FFC) is divesting from Hewlett-Packard (HP) and Veolia Environment. Ostensibly HP was guilty of providing technology consulting to the Israeli Navy, while Veolia was convicted for “environmental and social concerns.”

Naturally, the U.S. Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation gushed that it was “thrilled” that FFC was the “first U.S. national fund” to divest from those firms in reaction to demands from “Palestinian rights advocates.”

Read more here.

In the PCUSA, Even Leftists Oppose Divestment

30 Saturday Jun 2012

Posted by Bart Gingerich in News

≈ Comments Off on In the PCUSA, Even Leftists Oppose Divestment

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Barton Gingerich, BDS, divestment, Institute on Religion and Democracy, IRD Blog, Israel, Kairos, Middle East, Palestine, PCUSA, PFMEP, Presbyterian, Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), Presbyterian General Assembly 2012

Presbyterians gather at the PFMEP breakfast.

This morning in Pittsburgh, an alliance called Presbyterians for Middle East Peace (PFMEP) gathered to analyze the possible dangers of divestment from Israel. The issue is a hot one for Presbyterians at this year’s General Assembly. Commissioners receive pressures from within and without the denomination to make a principled stand on the issue. Pushing the issue to  special prominence is the Committee on Mission Responsibility Through Investment (MRTI), which recommends that GA entities such as the Presbyterian Foundation and the Board of Pensions sell all the stock they hold in Caterpillar, Hewitt-Packard, and Motorola since these companies do business with the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). Nevertheless, as this morning clearly showed, many Presbyterians of all persuasions have strong reservations against such actions.

Self-described leftist John Wimberly moderated the event. “If we’re for peace and justice, we’re going to have to get up early and go to bed late,” he said. “We come from all sides on many issues…I am so far to the Left…that even The Layman has considered me outside Presbyterianism,” he teased, “But we all agree that divestment is a flawed strategy theory for Middle East Peace.” He added, “It’s not fair; it’s not right; it’s not informed.” “Such an unfairness springs from a double standard…There are literally thousands of U.S. companies doing business with the Israeli Defense Force,” he commented. He also declared, “Effective peacemakers do not follow their frustrations to use ineffective and unfair means to peace.” Wimberly wryly observed that the divestment move is simply the tip of the iceberg with regard to Israel-Palestine policies. Anti-Israel activists have been diligently advocating for a strategy similar to that used against apartheid-era South Africa: Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS). This policy has one goal in mind: the one-sided capitulation of one party to another. Wimberly worried, “This is no longer a divestment issue but is about joining the BDS movement.”

Next up to the podium was the young Anna Eichler, who testified on behalf of her generation of peacemakers. She claimed, “My generation needs to have a peaceful interface in an interfaith dialogue.” “Fundamentally, it’s about relationships, not about name recognition,” she reported, “It’s more about what I say to my peers more than what my denomination says.” Eichler kept reinforcing the importance of working on the personal level rather than the impersonally corporate one, “not simply looking for a statement that would not make a strong impact.”

Dr. Cynthia Campbell echoed the preceding statements: “It is right for Christians to seek peace…The issue before us is about strategy.” She testified, “The long-range goal is not a peaceful settlement, but the capitulation of Israel…We give up hope to being bridge-builders but become partisans within the conflict.” “Unfortunately, we Presbyterians have failed to build up robust relationships with our Jewish colleagues to help find solutions and common ground on the issue,” she admitted.

David Berge recounted his tour of Israel: “There’s only so much land to go around, especially when it’s sacred real estate.” He informed listeners about “[Israel’s] neighbors who are ambivalent at best about its existence.” Berge warned, “There is a huge difference between making headlines and making lasting and global peace.”

Similarly, Bill Harter described the infamous Kairos Palestine statement as a “counterproductive document because it ignores the problem of terrorism…It is one point of view from the entire spectrum of Palestinian opinions.” Harter likewise surmised, “[BDS] will be seen as punitive; we’ll be written off.”

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