ICN, 14th August 2018
Operation Noah, the Christian climate change charity, has today launched a thought-provoking animated film, Sālote, to help Christians around the world recognise the human cost of a changing climate, and its particular impact on women and children.
While most adults in the UK think that climate change is real and caused primarily by human activity, many Christians don't yet see this as a faith issue. Among theologically conservative Christians in particular, recent polling indicates that concern for the future impact of environmental issues is taken less seriously than in other parts of the church.
The animated video Sālote, aimed at Christians of all ages and developed in partnership with the World Day of Prayer, a women-led, global, ecumenical movement, tells the story of Sālote, a seven-year old girl who is already experiencing the devastating impacts of climate change in her South Pacific island home. The film is inspired by real-life accounts of present-day climate change impacts, which hit the poor and vulnerable, living in sensitive parts of the world like low-lying islands, the hardest. UN figures indicate that women and children are 14 times more likely than men to die or be injured during extreme weather events such as cyclones, which are projected to increase significantly as global average temperatures rise.