Presbyterian Church USA: The climate crisis demands our bold and faithful response

On January 19, 2022, the Committee on Mission Responsibility Through Investment (MRTI) voted to recommend that the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) divest from five fossil fuel companies: Chevron, ExxonMobil, Marathon Petroleum, Phillips 66 and Valero Energy. The vote came after many years of Presbyterian Church USA shareholder engagement with these companies — a process in which shareholders, such as the PC(USA), use their position in public companies, such as these five energy companies, to influence corporate decision making.

In the last six years, the shareholder engagement of the denomination with these five companies has been directed by a set of guidelines crafted in consultation with communities on the frontlines of climate change as well as Fossil Free Presbyterian Church USA. The goal of these guidelines was to encourage the companies to support the commitment of the Paris Agreement, an international treaty on climate change, to work to limit global warming to below two degrees Celsius, preferably below 1.5 degrees.

In 2014, the Presbyterian Church USA first took up the question of investment in the fossil fuel industry. Back then, we Presbyterians could still reasonably argue that many people in our North American pews hadn’t yet experienced the climate crisis firsthand. Those of us who advocated for divestment believed it would be a bold and faithful strategy. Yet, we acknowledged that many of us had the racial and economic privilege that would prevent us from feeling the brunt of climate change: rising temperatures, more frequent and less predictable storms, hotter summers, and destabilized winter weather, all with the social and infrastructural implications of our broken world.

General Assembly’s first call to divest from companies engaging in fossil fuel extraction, production, and distribution was sent to MRTI, the Presbyterian Church USA committee that oversees shareholder engagement, not climate justice or divestment. Not only has MRTI done the engagement it’s tasked with doing, but they have also done the additional legwork to learn more about the climate crisis. We are grateful for that work. Now, we believe it’s time for a different and more comprehensive approach.

Shareholder engagement is a slow and methodical process by design. Meanwhile, millions of people around the world participated in the Climate Strikes in 2019, demanding real and fast action to respond to climate change. Meanwhile, trillions of dollars have been divested from the fossil fuel industry and reinvested in a just climate transition by over a thousand religious, municipal, and educational institutions. Meanwhile, more fossil-free options have emerged for individual and institutional investments. Given all of this, we believe the Presbyterian Church USA must create a new economic plan for dealing with climate change.

Governments worldwide have missed critical benchmarks outlined in the Paris Accord. United Nations summits have failed to adequately center the needs of communities that have faced the brunt of climate change. People around the world are feeling the effects of this crisis, regardless of social privilege. We are facing climate chaos, and we continue to fall short of God’s call to care for creation and love our neighbours.

With this recommendation to divest from five fossil fuel companies, the Presbyterian Church USA can support a wide array of climate and environmental justice overtures and recommendations in our General Assembly. We must be willing as a denomination to boldly support these endeavors from a place of faith, remembering the Gospel teaching, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will also be” (Matthew 6:21). It’s time to address climate change comprehensively: to reduce our carbon footprint, to invest in reforestation and a green future, to affirm and uphold international conventions on cooperative efforts, to support divestment from fossil fuels. In faith, let us do all the things.