Halki Summit highlights care for creation amid pandemic
The COVID-19 pandemic has provoked difficult questions about the links between the simultaneous health and ecological crises. How has environmental vandalism contributed to the spread of zoonotic disease? How will the pandemic affect our collective response to climate change and biodiversity loss? These issues were examined in late January at the virtual Halki Summit, the latest in a long series of environment-focused events convened by the Istanbul-based Ecumenical Patriarchate. The Ecumenical Patriarch is the ‘first among equals’ of Orthodox bishops. Halki, or Heybeliada, is the island near Istanbul where previous summits were hosted.
January 21, 2021
CWN Editor s Note: Born in 1940, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew was installed in 1991 as Archbishop of Constantinople and Ecumenical Patriarch; he holds a primacy of honor among the Orthodox churches. The topic of Halki Summit IV is “COVID-19 and Climate Change: Living with and Learning from a Pandemic”; speakers include the Ecumenical Patriarch, Bill McKibben, and Jeffrey Sachs.
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Halki Summit IV
Halki Summit IV, taking place on January 26-28, 2021 at 8:00-9:30 PM EST, will focus on the implications and lessons of COVID-19 in relation to climate change.
A recent Faith Matters blog, written by Archdeacon John Chryssavgis, shares that “for His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, Covid-19 has taught all of us the costly lesson of listening to and learning from one another, of “loving our neighbor as ourselves” so that the world may have life in abundance. In this sense, the pandemic has further reminded us that the world is much larger than our individual concerns and ambitions, much larger than our church confessions and faith communities, and much larger than any political leader or national interest.”