Promoting Peace and Sustainability

Interfaith Officer Shirley Murphy reports from the Our Age Festival, an event dedicated to sustainable development across the faith spectrum

In the UK today, we live in the conscious presence of religious diversity. Many congregations and members are located just a stone’s throw away from mosques, gurudwaras, Hindu temples, synagogues and viharas.

In their local communities, some members of our churches will be in daily contact with colleagues and neighbours of different faiths, and many have friendships across faith traditions.

Inter faith understanding is vital to the life of our churches. We all need the confidence to share our stories within a multi-faith society. There is a need to strengthen and resource the network of local interfaith advocates/enthusiasts, linking in with ecumenical partners.

We have to equip Christians for today’s multi-faith world. We believe the Church must remain present in diverse areas, and engage positively with other faiths.

Late last year, members of SGI-UK, (Soka Gakkai International, a worldwide society for the creation of value founded upon the Buddhism of Nichiren Daishonin) hosted a free four-day festival celebrating and promoting peace, education, culture and sustainability. There were panel discussions, forums, activities for school children and entertainment, all being held side by side with the Earth Charter and the SGI-UK exhibition Hands of Hope and Action, demonstrating how each of us can make a real difference to the world.

I was invited to speak from the Christian point of view on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (https://sdgs.un.org/goals) drawn up by the United Nations. One of these is eradicating poverty; another is zero hunger which is done in many of our churches that run food banks, soup kitchens, breakfast clubs etc.

We as individuals and as churches can make changes in our own lives - at home, at work and in the community - by supporting local farmers or markets and making sustainable food choices and fighting food waste. Most of our churches now use Fair Trade coffee, teas and biscuits. Our participation in the ECO Churches scheme also covers another of the SDGs, as does the Restoring Welsh Rivers Summit held by the Church in Wales which focused on waterways and the importance of clean, safe rivers to our health and ecosystems.

SDGs are a blueprint for a better, more sustainable future for all. They are all interconnected and, in order to leave no one behind, it is important that we achieve them by 2030.

Finally, as churches we need to encourage collaboration between communities and local authorities to raise public awareness and drive local action to achieve some of these goals as individuals and churches thereby promoting peace, working together to achieve sustainability. Collegiality is the key.