Introduction, by Kathy Galloway and Katharine M. Preston

Introduction

Living Faithfully in the Time of Creation

Although some of us knew each other, for others, the faces displayed on our screens last autumn were meeting for the first time. It was the first Zoom call for the Iona Community’s newly formed Common Concern Network –Environment (CCN-Enviro).1 Our moderator, Ran Nisbett, from Alabama, USA, was faced with the task of organising a motley group of representatives from four continents.

Wonderful to be together, eye to eye, but … what was next?

We knew, indeed, we did have ‘common concerns’. Many of us have been involved with environmental justice in one way or another for decades. We are steeped in a love for the natural world and concern for the threats to it, and to those marginalised people who are bearing the brunt of the effects of the climate emergency.

Our Iona Community Rule is clear: we need to work ‘for justice and peace, wholeness and reconciliation in our localities, society and the whole creation’.

2 But what could a group from across Europe, America, Africa and Australia actually do together to further our commitment and address our climate emergency?

Fairly quickly, COP26 (the United Nations Conference of the Parties, 26th Climate Change Conference), rescheduled from 2020 to the autumn of 2021 in Glasgow, presented itself as an opportunity not to be missed. The Iona Community’s base is in Glasgow and faith communities throughout Scotland and the rest of the UK were already seeking ways to become involved.

What unique contribution could the Iona Community, via its CCN-Enviro, offer? Wild Goose Publications and the Wild Goose Resource Group are the most publicly visible aspects of the Community’s work, so a publication with liturgical and other resources for churches came to mind. A ‘Season of Creation’, traditional to some communities of faith, conveniently preceded the COP26 meetings, forming a specific timetable.

Thus, Living Faithfully in the Time of Creation was born. As members of the CCN-Enviro and as two writers always happy to engage with other writers, we offered to shepherd this book through the initial editing process.

14 Living Faithfully in the Time of Creation

We are blessed to have had more than 20 contributors, including some from other regions of the world, willing to write reflections on scripture or essays. Working with them revealed vital new perspectives on the challenges facing the world. We also asked John Bell and Jo Love of the Wild Goose Resource Group to create a new liturgy that could be used during the ‘Season of Creation’, through the weeks of COP26, and that could also be adapted in future years.

We gathered together appropriate liturgical resources and sought out websites throughout the world to provide further guidance on actions that could be undertaken by local faith communities in response to the climate emergency.

There is a great deal to do and not much time in which to do it. We pray this small volume provides strands of hope and motivation for you to live faithfully during all seasons, joining other brothers and sisters across the world seeking a community of willing reconciliation with the planet.

Kathy Galloway (UK) and Katharine M. Preston (USA), on behalf of the Iona Community’s Common Concern Network – Environment, April 2021

Notes

1. The Iona Community Common Concern Network: https://iona.org.uk/about-us/concerns

2. The Rule of the Iona Community: https://iona.org.uk/movement/the-rule