How Climate Advocates Are Experiencing Joy in Unlikely Times 

Each week, I receive emails from climate organizations with subject lines that sound the alarm about something that deserves urgent action. To be honest, I can see how one might become numb to such emails—not because one does not care, but because caring can sink one deeper into despair, especially if one feels powerless to do anything. For this reason, I want to begin not with one of the recent egregious actions by the Trump administration, but by talking about what might seem like an unlikely topic in discussing climate change: joy. 

Recently, I was meeting with the chapter leaders for Climate Hope Affiliates, a national network of faith-rooted chapters devoted to taking regular actions like meeting with congressional offices, publishing op-eds and letters to the editor, tabling at community events, and giving presentations in the community. A chapter leader from Concord, New Hampshire, named Sue Moore made a comment that has stayed with me and caused me to reframe how I respond to news of the latest climate injustice. The chapter leaders were talking about how they witnessed joy in their local groups, and Moore said:  “You know, I have to say just one thing: the joy comes from the ability to be able to do what we are doing.”  

The observation that action brings joy offers an important insight. We live in a world in which it is common to feel like one does not have much agency over the circumstances of one’s life in the face of climate change and societal injustices. To then be part of a group in which people have monthly actions to take and are taking them with the support and encouragement of a community of friends quickly becomes an experience of joy because of the difference one is now able to make as part of a larger effort. 

I thought of Moore’s comment as I sent out the monthly action sheet to Climate Hope Affiliates. Central to the action sheet was indeed something that should rightly cause alarm: Trump’s EPA recently boasted that it has the “strongest enforcement and compliance results in years” when, in fact, the opposite is true. Thankfully, Laura Thoms from Earthjustice exposed the EPA’s outrageous lies and distortions. She also underscored the seriousness of what is at stake: 

…it’s clear that we must continue to hold the administration accountable for the collapse in enforcement of environmental laws. These are the laws that protect children from being exposed to toxic chemicals in schoolyards, that stop factories from belching cancer-causing smoke into the air, and that prevent untreated sewage from reaching our drinking water. These laws are empty promises without enforcement.    

Our humanity causes us to respond to the suffering of others with a range of emotions, from despair to anger. At the same time, the realization that we will not be letting the administration’s lies go unanswered because we will be taking action with others throughout the country becomes the basis for both hope and joy. Your local newspaper likely has not covered this story, but now you have the opportunity to make sure this news lands in its pages by writing a letter or an op-ed. People in your community, including your members of Congress, will then become aware of what is happening. To go a step further, one can have a letter-writing party at one’s church and give presentations to local organizations. Soon, the joy of taking action is spreading.

Ultimately, we want our actions to lead to policy change on the part of our members of Congress, and that is the primary aim of the Climate Hope Affiliate action sheet for this month. As Congress deliberates over funding for the EPA, policymakers need to tie money to mission and hold the EPA accountable for its actions. Join with us in being an action-taker and joy-maker!

ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Brooks Berndt is the Minister for Environmental Justice for the National Ministries of the United Church of Christ.