COP30 Reflections and Prayer

So, where are we now as a world as we come to the next COP?   The planet’s last 10 years have been the hottest on record; and in 2024 we overshot the 1.5^oC, which was set at the Paris Agreement of 2015 as a world temperature we should not exceed. As the forests of the world disappear, as land is used for building and for farming; what is left can no longer absorb the CO₂ we produce.  The world’s oceans have been absorbing about 90% of the extra heat created from the human-caused climate crisis.  As we have exceeded our first ‘official tipping point’ the warming of the seas has led to global coral bleaching.  The other two tipping points we are so close to are the loss of the Amazonian forest – which would result in a massive savannah; and the continued melting of the Arctic and rising sea levels globally. 

If temperatures rise much further, the Antarctic Ice Shelf will continue to melt, causing further sea rises, and global currents being affected, such as AMOC (Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation) which transports warm water to the North Atlantic and is the basis for the Gulf Stream.  If this fails, it could lead to significant climate shifts, and a colder Northern Europe (including the UK).  Tundras will also continue to melt faster, pushing vast amounts of methane into the atmosphere (a shorter lasting, but faster acting warming gas).

So where are we in relation to our world?  Changes caused by global warming don’t only affect humanity – there are impacts such as islands nations disappearing under rising waters, increasing storms, fires and desertification. In addition, the many creatures of the sea and the land, plants, insects and the tiniest microbes of the sea and land on which all life depends are all also affected. 

Researchers have warned that the lifestyle-related emissions of citizens of the world’s wealthiest nations must fall by 94% by 2035 if the worst impacts of the climate crisis are to be avoided.  Worldwide, we are still 60% above where we need to be. 

However, the huge investments worldwide in green energy have now indicated the beginning of the end of the oil era. Investors and Pension funds are no longer investing in oil, but green energy.  But this hasn’t stopped oil companies investing in fossil fuel ventures in the Amazonian basin, Ecuador and Peru.  The gas giants might be fighting hard, but their end is in sight.  And their money will be wasted, as the oil and gas we already have access to will be more than enough during the transition to a green economy.  Countries across the world are investing in solar panels, including China which has added more green energy than the rest of the world combined in the last year; India and many African nations are starting to install solar, as well as Saudi Arabia. In the UK more than half our electricity is produced by wind and solar (just published the Government’s latest Climate Plan: Carbon Budget and Growth Delivery Plan).  It is now seen as ‘an unstoppable revolution’, with predictions that renewables will double by 2030. 

Alongside this, we need to remember our nature; God’s nature.  Indigenous people understand our wild land; they are not ‘separated’ from their world, nor do they see that humans are superior to nature; but are part of it.   We often refer just to the Creation Story when talking about the relationship between man and the rest of nature, but there are many less well-known Biblical References in both the New and Old Testaments where God shows us the equality of life, and makes his covenant with not only us, but all of nature.  Science tells us that in one handful of good organic soil, there are more microbes than people on the planet.  And what does God make Adam from?  The earth beneath our feet.  Which we totally rely upon to survive.  Something we should remember. Everyday. 

Although we have lost many creatures forever, hope in nature is not lost; forests and vegetation are being grown across Africa, restoring degraded landscapes whilst providing food security and work for millions.  Once finished, it will be the largest living structure on earth.  One of Brazil’s initiatives will be the Tropical Forests Forever facility which aims to protect standing forests and the homes of Indigenous peoples.  New methods of rice production being trialled give out half the amount of methane emissions as the traditional methods (rice production currently produces 35% of all global methane emissions).  Parts of the coral reefs are doing well in cooler waters and oceanic reserves are showing fast recovery of many species.  The same goes for protected land; nature recovers; it survives underground; it is spread by birds and insects.  We just need to respect it.  God made our world to recover if we allow it to do so, and not let financial greed rule the world.  A greener world will be a more equal one for all.  If you look at the forest, the sea or the sky, do you still feel we are part of it, or have we crossed a line?  If so, we need to relearn to be a part of nature again.

When Antonio Guterres was asked how he will feel when he retires as head of the UN next year, he said “I will never give up my commitment  to help and support all the democratic movements around the world who are fighting, and fighting hard for the most precious possession we have, which is our Mother Nature”.

Many of us feel the same way – despite the overwhelming odds, despite our fear for the future (and research has shown 86% of adults and young people suffer from ‘climate-anxiety’).  But we must not run from that fear, but turn around and fight it; for the future, for every creature, for our well-being, for God’s Creation. One snowflake does not make a snowball; one snowball does not make an avalanche – we need all of us, all the snowflakes to make that avalanche of change; for all of us; all of nature; our world.

Christine Wetherall

October 2025

(Based on an interview with Antonio Guterres, head of the UN, ahead of COP30)

A prayer for COP30

Dear Lord, we thank you for your wondrous, amazing creation, which is more than we can understand; from the smallest life here on Earth, to the vastness of space.

As COP30 begins, may we pray for wisdom; for purpose in saving our wildlife; for safety for all peoples. May the whole world move constructively towards reducing global warming at this time.  In Your Name.

Amen