I marched a week ago with 310,000 people in NYC , to send a message to the world that climate change is real and needs our attention. I believe this to be true because I have scientific training, attend scientific conferences, read papers on climate, and read reports by climate change researchers. I care about it because I am a Christian. I love the natural world, the art work of God. I love my neighbor, I love the creator.  Caring about giant changes in the world wrought by human action has to be a part of this love.

Next to me was a group of scientists. Coming from all over, they did not all know each other before the march.  They wore lab coats, and little stickers that said “Science Stands”.  I walked and talked with a biologist from Texas.  One of the organizers was a microbiologist from NYC.  They were marching not only about climate, but about science  and science education itself.   I could have easily chosen to walk with them and I was thrilled that the organizers put scientists and faith communities together in the same section.  In my life, these communities do not need to be at odds.

The group I was walking with included Christian college students, people from the Christian Reformed Church, staff from Young Evangelicals for Climate Action. John and Barbara Elwood (of the blog BelovedPlanet).   Ahead of me was a group from Harvard’s Divinity School.  Far to the front, a friend of mine was walking with a group of investors.  The crowd was so large that she had marched, and was on her bus on the way back to Washington, D.C. before I finished walking.  I have never been in a group so large. It was energizing and humbling to be a part of such an action.

Climate change, and other environmental degradations, are the outworking of excess, cumulative impacts of all of our actions, and unintended consequences of things we sometimes did for good reason.   This reality- that it is no one person, and no one action we have to change, makes it more difficult to solve.  Nonetheless, pretending that it isn’t really happening will not help us. People often ask me for a list of things they can do. I often resist giving such a list, in part because I don’t think most of the change we need now will be because individuals change their light bulbs. It will be because of corporate actions,  large scale impacts which will both come out of the many small behaviors of individuals but will also change those behaviors.  It will involve changes to the way governments and large corporations do business.

I do not know the impact of the Sept 21 Climate March. I do know we tried to send a signal to the UN , the world, and to leaders of the US that this matters and needs attention now.  I know it sent a signal to me, myself, to work on the things I am able to, and yell about the things we need to do together.