Kingston: 60 Attend Inter-faith and Environment Forum
By Catrina Pickering 11th January 2011
About 60 participants from the Kingston area turned out to enjoy the talks, food and small group discussions at the interfaith forum on sustainability in the Guildhall on 28th October 2010. The forum was organised by Kingston Borough Council and Kingston Interfaith Forum in partnership with Transition Town Kingston. Many faiths and non-faiths were represented.
Lead speaker Muzammal Hussain from the Islamic Ecological Community Activist group, Wisdom in Nature, gave a deeply inspiring talk in which he argued the sustainability movement has so far been too focused on the intellect and needs to take more of a heart perspective, thereby enabling us to look more systemically at the root causes of climate change and peak oil. He cited great leaders such as Mahatma Gandhi and Aung San Suu Kyi both who have taken a deeply spiritual, non-violent perspective in effecting action and change. Second lead speaker, Quaker Laurie Michaelis stated quite simply that “Perhaps the greatest challenge posed by climate change is to develop the personal and collective will for a new way of life”. The presentations were then followed by food and small group discussions considering the advantages and challenges of a simple and sustainable life, the action we need to take, and what the texts of various faiths say about this.
The meeting was a huge success in making links between sustainability and faiths and in making connections between faiths and Transition Town Kingston. Follow ups are now being planned.
Booklet prepared for the event on faiths and environment
For further information, see: www.ttkingston.org/pdfs/TTKnews0050.pdf.