Bishop urges immediate action after 'grim and disturbing' climate change report

Glacier melt. Photo William Bossen on Unsplash

Source: CBCEW

Bishop John Arnold of Salford, Lead Bishop for the Environment, has called for urgent action in response to a new report published today by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a United Nations body for assessing the science related to climate change.

The AR6 is the Sixth Assessment Report of the IPCC, the first was published in 1990, and follows a study of more than 14,000 scientific papers on global warming and its impact on our common home.

One of the starkest conclusions is that the Earth has warmed 1.09C since pre-industrial times and many changes such as sea-level rise and glacier melt are now virtually irreversible. 1.07C of the 1.09C warming is due to greenhouse gases associated with human activities.

Bishop Arnold said: "The grim and disturbing findings of the AR6 report only reinforce the message of Pope Francis' Laudato Si - we must do everything we can, and now, to protect and defend Our Common Home.

"World leaders must come together with urgency for the common good and commit to making real progress, on a global level, not just pay lip service to the facts and figures of which we are all too aware. This is a time to be acting for the common good, not self-interest or self-serving politics."

The IPCC last looked at the science of global warming in 2013.

LINKS

Read the IPPC Report here: www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/

CAFOD tells PM: Time to throw kitchen sink at climate change: www.indcatholicnews.com/news/42802