News Items

The Forum regularly posts news articles of interest here from a variety of sources and news outlets. You can check back here or view the most recent ones from the homepage. We also archive these articles here, for those doing research, with news going back to 2006. Use the menu on the right to explore the archived articles.

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Spiritual Environmentalism: Healing Ourselves by Replenishing the Earth

Wangari Maathai: What role does spirituality play in our work to heal the earth?

By Wangari Maathai
Yes! Magazine
Posted: June 3, 2011
Updated: September 26, 2011 

Editor’s Note: Wangari Maathai, the Kenyan activist and 2004 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, passed away on September 25. In this essay from her book...

UNEP Pays Tribute to Professor Wangari Maathai

September 26, 2011
United Nations Environment Programme

Nairobi - Professor Wangari Maathai, Nobel Peace Prize laureate, founder of Kenya’s Green Belt Movement and patron of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) Billion Tree Campaign, has died in Nairobi. She was 71 years old.

Professor Maathai was one of Africa’s foremost environmental campaigners...

A Pastoral Teaching from the House of Bishops of The Episcopal Church

September 2011
Episcopal Church Office of Public Affairs

The Episcopal Church House of Bishops, meeting in Province IX, in Quito, Ecuador, issued the following Pastoral Teaching:


A Pastoral Teaching from the House of Bishops of The Episcopal Church
Quito, Ecuador

We, your bishops, believe these words of Jeremiah describe these times and...

Clean Earth to Till: An Environmental Vision of Redemption

September 2011
By Rabbi Lawrence Troster
Jewcology

On the Immorality of Fracking

September 20, 2011
By Br. Dave Andrews
Sojourners

Illness among people and livestock.

Tainted drinking water.

Explosions and fires.

These are some of the discovered effects of hydraulic fracking – a growing, and increasingly controversial, method of harnessing natural gas for energy production.

Yet as more policymakers explore the so-called benefits...

Warming affects Hindu pilgrimage in Indian Kashmir

September 18, 2011
By Peerzada Arshad Hamid
Alertnet

PAHALGAM, India (AlertNet) – A very long way from home, Arvin Prasad Goel clutched his wife’s hand as they prepared to eat in a makeshift communal kitchen set up on the Himalayan mountainside.

They were weary from a four-day trek through rough terrain and cold weather to visit the Amarnath cave, perched at an altitude...

Interfaith Conference On Climate Change

September 18, 2011
All Africa Global Media Date

Indalo Yethu/All Africa Global Media via COMTEX – The threat of climate change is not just a scientific concern but a profound ethical challenge that demands leadership from all sectors of society.

Progress Can Make Us More Spiritual, Not Less

September 13, 2011
By Duane Elgin
Huffington Post

An Environmental Confession for the High Holidays

September 7, 2011
By Rabbi Lawrence Troster
Huffington Post

The Jewish month of Elul is the last month in the year and marks the beginning of the season of repentance that culminates with Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the Ten Days of Repentance, also known as the High Holidays.

The Jewish concept of repentance is called Teshuvah (“return” in English) and one of...

Decision on Canadian tar sands pipeline is chance for Obama to fulfill an environmental promise

September 1, 2011
By Russell Powell
New Haven Register

SIXTY-five people, including me, were arrested Aug. 20 and spent the weekend in jail for holding a nonviolent sit-in in front of the White House. It was the first day of a planned two weeks of civil disobedience, where thousands from across the country would sit down to demonstrate against the proposed construction of the...

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