INTERFAITH GLOBAL CLIMATE CHANGE CAMPAIGNS
WEST VIRGINIA
Coordinator: Marcia Leitch
P.O. Box 226
Talcott, WV 24981-0226
home: 304-466-0982
fax: 304-466-4790
email: jmleitch@mountain.net
Church Action Against Global Warming
Friday March 1, 2002
Charleston Gazette
WEST Virginia's churches have a wide variety of beliefs, but several
denominations think alike in opposing the dangers of pollution and global
warming. More than 80 churches, ministers and groups have united in the
West Virginia Interfaith Global Climate Change Campaign. They're sounding
an alarm about the buildup of "greenhouse gases" that cause
ever-hotter weather, and
they also oppose oil drilling in the pristine Arctic National Wildlife
Refuge.
Presbyterian Marcia Leitch of Summers County, coordinator of the effort,
and other leaders recently told the Gazette that health and the quality
of life will suffer in the future, unless tougher action is taken against
such ravages. "It's a justice issue," Leitch told reporter Bob
Schwarz. "What kind of world are we leaving our children and grandchildren?"
For West Virginia churches to speak out on these issues takes courage, because their drive impinges upon the state's largest industry. Coal burning is a major producer of the fumes that hover in the atmosphere and trap heat, warming the planet's surface to hazardous levels.
Scientists warn that the heat will cause more weather disasters, spread tropical diseases and flood low-lying regions as melting of the polar ice caps raises sea levels. Already, the 11,000 residents of Tuvalu in the Pacific are being forced to abandon their island nation because rising seas relentlessly are swamping it.
The church stand also contradicts the wishes of the Bush administration, which scuttled the Kyoto treaty against global warming, and which wants to drill in the Arctic refuge. Nonetheless, we wish the religious activists every success in their crusade for a more livable world.
This article was taken from the Charleston Gazette, http://wvgazette.com/news/Editorials/2002022881/
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