A LENT campaign exploring how extractive industries, such as drilling for oil and gas, and logging and mining, are causing climate breakdown and economic inequality has been launched by the World Council of Churches (WCC).
The campaign is part of its decade of Climate Action, from 2025 to 2034, to encourage Christians to confront systems that harm creation, and to speak out for positive alternatives.
It has published resources to encourage “a Global Systemic Carbon Fast”, starting with the theology of enough, drawn from Proverbs 30: “Give me neither poverty nor riches, but give me only my daily bread.”
The campaign asks: “As a church or community, you can ask yourselves: where do we see people or parts of creation that do not have enough? What factors beyond individual responsibility contribute to and intensify this lack?
“Voice your opinions when it comes to certain policies, which further strengthen those structures. Once these structures become visible, you may also begin to see how you, your church, or your community contribute to sustaining them. Making exploitative structures visible and beginning to imagine different possibilities are important starting points for living out a Theology of Enough.”
The WCC Water Network has also called for reflection on water justice, including access to water and sanitation.
Its campaign, Seven Weeks for Water, is a part of the carbon fast. Seven weeks of prayer, reflection, and action seek to address personal carbon footprints alongside the economic systems driving climate change and water contamination. The campaign ends World Water Day, 1 April.
“Water justice is inseparable from gender justice. When we see women and girls walking hours for water while being excluded from decisions about water management, we witness a profound violation of dignity that the church cannot ignore,” the WCC’s Ecumenical Water Network co-ordinator, Dinesh Suna, said.
“The Seven Weeks for Water invites us to reflect, pray, and act — to ensure that access to clean water becomes a lived reality for all God’s children, especially those who have been marginalized for too long.”
The director of the WCC’s Commission on Climate Justice and Sustainable Development, Athena Peralta, said: “As we enter the Ecumenical Decade of Climate Justice Action, Seven Weeks for Water reminds us that climate change amplifies existing inequalities — and women are among the people who bear the heaviest burden. This campaign integrates with our Global Systemic Carbon Fast, showing how our Lenten disciplines can address both immediate water needs and the long-term climate crisis.”