{"id":7089,"date":"2017-11-02T07:44:55","date_gmt":"2017-11-02T07:44:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/?p=7089"},"modified":"2017-11-02T07:44:55","modified_gmt":"2017-11-02T07:44:55","slug":"faith-finance-and-ecology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2017\/11\/02\/faith-finance-and-ecology\/","title":{"rendered":"Faith, finance and ecology"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>There was a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.arcworld.org\/news.asp?pageID=858\">seminar<\/a> in Zug the other day\u00a0organised by ARC**, the\u00a0Alliance of Religions and Conservation; sadly, I wasn't invited. \u00a0It was a meeting of the great, the good, and the ugly. \u00a0The <a href=\"https:\/\/www.economist.com\/blogs\/erasmus\/2017\/11\/faith-finance-and-ecology\">Economist<\/a> reported it:\u00a0<em>Green investors and right-wing sceptics clash on the meaning of scripture \u2013 faith and investment seek a new partnership<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The article began:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>\"In the Swiss town of Zug, a high-powered gathering of faith leaders, investment\u00a0gurus and\u00a0environmentalists met to consider how bodies with ample funds at their disposal, including religious organisations,\u00a0could use that wealth for the benefit of life on earth.\u00a0One of the star speakers was Cardinal Peter Turkson, a Ghanaian who was recently put in charge of a powerful new\u00a0Vatican agency (an amalgamation of four others) that is charged\u00a0with \u201cpromoting integral human development\". \u00a0The\u00a0agency's job, he explained, covers human rights, development, the environment and the economy. It aims to put into practice the\u00a0social teachings of the last three popes.\"<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The cardinal\u00a0insisted that businessmen who were believers could not fence off their faith from their professional activities, and\u00a0Gunnela Hahn, head of \u201cresponsible investment\u201d at the Swedish Lutheran Church, agreed. \u00a0It seems that there was much concord on all this.<\/p>\n<p>A counter point was put by\u00a0Scott Pruitt, head of the USA's the Environment Protection Agency which now (I had missed this)\u00a0declines to take advice from anyone who has received funding from the EPA. \u00a0You'll not be the first to note that this gives undue influence to outfits that the EPA is supposed to regulate. \u00a0Pruitt cited a passage from the Book of Joshua, in which pagans were instructed to \u201cchoose\u00a0this day whom you will serve\u201d: the old deities\u00a0or the new one. \u00a0Indeed; a choice we all make every morning.<\/p>\n<p>.................................................<\/p>\n<p>**ARC is a secular body founded by Prince Philip. \u00a0It helps the major religions of the world to develop their own environmental programmes, based on their own core teachings, beliefs and practices. It is the main partner for the UN in working with faith outfits on the SDGs.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There was a seminar in Zug the other day\u00a0organised by ARC**, the\u00a0Alliance of Religions and Conservation; sadly, I wasn't invited. \u00a0It was a meeting of the great, the good, and the ugly. \u00a0The Economist reported it:\u00a0Green investors and right-wing sceptics...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7089","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7089","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7089"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7089\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7089"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7089"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7089"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}