World Council of Churches (WCC) Justice, Peace, and Creation (JPC)

In the 1970s, the WCC began to recognize the connections between justice, peace, and ecological sustainability. At the Vancouver Assembly in 1983, the WCC encouraged member churches to publicly commit to addressing environmental concerns as part of a common effort to promote Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation, which became known as the JPIC process. In 1988, the WCC launched its Climate Change Program to promote the transformation of socioeconomic structures and personal lifestyle choices that contribute to global warming. In 1990, the WCC sponsored the World Convocation on Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation in Seoul, Korea. Climate Change was at the center of one of four covenants at the Seoul convocation. At the Canberra Assembly in 1991 the WCC strongly affirmed the JPIC process, and a Justice, Peace, and Creation Unit was formed. That same year, the WCC initiated its Theology of Life Study, which drew on the experiences of twenty-two local groups from around the world, each reflecting on one of the ten affirmations made at the 1990 World Convocation on Justice, Peace, and the Integrity of Creation. The purpose of Study was to ground WCC theology more firmly in the lived experiences of local communities around the globe. The WCC strongly engaged with the preparatory process and the follow-up to the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) summit in Rio de Janeiro. It participated in all of the sessions of the United Nations (UN) Commission on Sustainable Development and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The WCC regularly addressed the delegates to the UNFCCC and organized seminars and worship services accompanying the events. In 1995, the WCC presented a petition with approximately 500,000 signatures to the UNFCCC in Bonn. In 1997, the coordinator of the WCC Climate Change Program, David Hallman, delivered a “justice statement” to a gathering of senior governmental officials at the summit on climate change in Kyoto, Japan. The current JPC team was formed during the restructuring of the WCC after the Harare Assembly in 1998. In 1999, issue sixteen of Echoes, published by the JPC team, was entitled, “The Earth as Mother,” and featured articles relating to the environment and Indigenous peoples in various parts of the globe. The WCC has also published study documents and books on issues related to climate change and sustainable development.