In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. James 2:17 (NIV)
The Epistle of James has long attracted some controversy. Martin Luther famously called it “an epistle of straw”, as he didn’t like James’ emphasis on works. The debate between those who believe salvation is primarily achieved by faith, and those who see it as primarily through works or deeds, has continued down the ages. You will probably be relieved to hear that I am not going there! Here, I want to consider one aspect of faith and action, the relationship between Christian faith and environmental action. I recently had an opportunity to help investigate this topic in some detail. Firstly, how did this come about, and secondly, what did I discover?
I am primarily a plant and environmental scientist, but over the last 20 years or so, I have also done some work on faith and environment, mostly at the popular level, but increasingly at a more academic level. So, I have already second-supervised one doctorate in this area to completion. It is often useful to have an environmental scientist on the supervisory team for a project looking at faith and environment. A bit over a year ago, I was asked by Johannes Luetz of Alphacrucis University College in Australia if I might be interested in joining him in supervising Tim Healy’s doctorate. Johannes is a social scientist who is particularly interested in investigating environmental issues from spiritual, humanitarian, and policy perspectives. Tim’s doctorate is looking at environmental theology in Australian theological institutions. I have long been interested in this topic in UK theological institutions, and I readily agreed to the invitation. Tim’s work is making good progress, and the three of us meet on Zoom fairly regularly. At one of our meetings, Johannes asked Tim and me if we would like to participate in some research on a somewhat related topic, looking at the impacts of the Christian faith on environmental action. We both thought this would be a good idea.
Every year in Australia, NCLS Research carry out the Australian Community Survey (ACS), a large survey of Australian public opinion on a variety of topics. Academics, like Johannes, are able to buy space in the survey and to include questions of their own. So, we had a large amount of data to look at, and Johannes asked for our thoughts. I got to work analysing the results, and soon came to a rather remarkable conclusion. Australian Christians thought that their faith should make them more environmentally responsible, but actually, it didn’t. Let’s unpack that a bit. The ACS divided the 1295 people who took their survey into four categories: Christians attending church at least once a month; Christians attending less than once a month; non-Christians; and no religion. The panel were asked whether they agreed or disagreed with the following statement: “The Christian faith helps people to be more environmentally responsible.” Christians who were frequent attenders at church were much more likely to agree with this statement than those from the other groups. But when the panel were asked what actions they had taken to reduce impact on the environment (e.g. switching off lights, recycling), the Christians looked very similar to everyone else! On civic actions (e.g. demonstrating, writing to elected representatives), if anything, the Christians came out worse than anyone else.
Why is this? It is not a totally new finding. In the consumer studies literature, intention–behaviour inconsistencies have frequently been reported. People with pro-environmental values do not always act on them. There are many reasons for this inaction, which we divided into three types: cognitive/psychological (micro), including concerns that small actions will have any impact; cultural–theological (meso), for example, worries that the environment is considered a political issue; and structural/institutional (macro), often involving capacity constraints. So, there are many reasons for inaction, but surely churches should be ideal places to tackle this problem?
Johannes produced a detailed plan for moving church congregations from inaction to action with seven guiding principles:
(1) Make civic participation a normal practice in churches.
(2) Foster collective efficacy within small groups.
(3) Lower hassle by using default participation.
(4) Ground public initiatives in Christian principles and values.
(5) Facilitate partnerships and promote available opportunities.
(6) Utilise public commitments and implement feedback mechanisms.
(7) Strengthen leadership and worship practices to amplify their impact.
The good news is that there is a lot that churches can do in this area. This blog is a brief summary of our paper, “Faith without action? Christian ecological conviction and the civic participation gap in Australia”. The article is now published in the journal, Ambio, and is open access, so you can view it for free.
Being a scientist, at the end of a paper, I always wonder what to do next. In the present work, the only division we had for Christians was based on their attendance at church. Of course, there are different denominations, churchmanships and theologies all mixed in there. How would these different groupings respond?
OK, so that is Australia, what about the UK? Would we get similar results with a survey here? I think probably yes, in most cases. However, in the UK context, the Eco Church programme has been phenomenally successful, with over 9,000 churches signed up, about 20% of churches in England and Wales, and over 100 gold awards. From my observations, the churches that are taking the Eco Church scheme seriously are already doing many of the seven principles outlined above. I have a feeling that their congregations may respond differently, but that would be a whole new survey!
To conclude. Christian faith does not necessarily lead to environmental action, even if we think it should. There are many barriers that cause inaction, but churches worldwide have a major opportunity to break down those barriers. Let’s hope they will take that opportunity.
Dr. Martin J. Hodson
Principal Tutor of Christian Rural and Environmental Studies (CRES)
Photo. Shutterstock Asset id: 2753920213: Historic Uniting Church building in Penguin town, Tasmania, Australia – 01 10 2024 (Oleg Podzorov)