One of the things that’s hotting up in our culture is the climate change debate. There appears to be wide support for the science on climate change, whilst also a voluble minority who regard the whole thing as some kind of over-exaggerated conspiracy. Participating in the recent WAVE bike ride focused this for me.

Personally, just to be clear, I do buy the science, but even if I didn’t, it is clear to me if, as Christians, we are about justice for all people it is increasingly important for us to work out how we might live together on the planet to achieve that ideal. Pressure on the world’s food supplies, water availability and natural resources surely place a responsibility on us all "to live more simply in order that others might simply live."

The current recession seems to flag up the fear amongst politicians about the political costs of facing the future realistically. As I have said on many occasions, most political solutions to get us out of recession seem to focus on re-creating the climatic conditions that got us into this mess in the first place. Economies that rely on huge levels of consumption fuelled by high levels of personal debt are very likely unsustainable.

The Bible places a responsibility on us to responsibly look after the whole earth (Genesis 1 ) not just our bit of it. Justice for all will not come about if the G20 nations rule the world for their own benefit and not with responsibility for all people.

Should the Church take a lead in all this? I believe we should. Is it possible to believe that we might not just talk about a different way of living on the planet which will benefit all human flourishing, but that as a community we might truly begin to live our lives differently? Is there such a life and what would it look like?

These are searching questions.

My guess is that a good many people are frankly defeated as to how to set about this. I confess that it is confusing to be told today that something is good and sustainable practice, only to be told tomorrow that it’s not. This happens too many times and trying to motivate us by guilt really doesn’t work.

I conclude that before we shall really begin to tackle global injustice, we need a change of climate in the way we think. It’s too easy to sit around blaming bankers and hedge fund managers for their out of control greed when my own desire to have yet more stuff is also out of control. Only when we start to think straight will we start to ask straight.

I sometimes wonder whether we Christians look as though we have found a different way of living to the wider world or whether the reality of our situation is that people look at us and conclude that we live life exactly like everyone else with a bit of churchgoing thrown in! Such a scenario would be both tragic and hope-less.

This much is clear to me. The world will not be saved by superficiality. We have to put our faith to work, not just to maintain a culture or a building, but to make the world a bigger and better place for all human flourishing.