The inside story of how Presbyterians in Ireland Divested from Fossil Fuels


It's been a while since I've updated this blog, life has been busy. But I want to capture my feeling and thoughts from over the last few months with some back-dated posts. Here goes...

My goodness, they did it!  The Presbyterians followed the Church of Ireland's lead and also committed to full divestment from fossil fuels. This means they will move about £3m out of BP and Shell - wow!

A press release on the news was published on the Presbyterian Church website.  Here are some quotes from it.

'Climate change is not only an environmental issue. Climate change is a poverty issue. It’s a hunger issue. It’s an issue of inequality and injustice.’ - Prof Katharine Hayhoe
The church is adopting a 'divest and engage' strategy, which means dumping investments from companies that extract fossil fuels and engaging with large consumers of fossil fuels so that they set targets for Net-Zero emissions.

Some of the mainstream press also picked up the story, for example RTE News, said "It means the three largest Christian churches in Ireland are taking a similar approach to divestment in the industry." The Belfast Newsletter also covered the news.

This is a tremendous achievement by a small group of Presbyterians who have working in the background - with some gentle guidance from myself. Here is a little background on how it happened.

Over the last year or two, I've made connections with some Presbyterians on Twitter and got a feeling that some clergy were trying to move climate action forwards, but it was an uphill struggle. Then at an online Tearfund training course on Christianity and Climate Change with Prof Katharine Hayhoe I met the Rev Liz Hughes who is a senior minister in the Presbyterian Church. She is just wonderful. She really understood the problem of climate change and the ethical need to divest from fossil fuels.

Liz arranged for me to give a presentation to her colleagues, some of whom work in the Assembly Buildings - the headquarters of the church itself. I gave this presentation on divestment to them that highlighted the ethical and financial reasons for divestment, and the need to continue to strengthen engagement with major fossil fuel consumers and funders like banks and insurance companies.

This presentation gave them food for thought and they went off to draft a resolution up for the General Assembly.

Meanwhile, I gathered together a bunch of presbyterian students who were committed to climate action. I'd invited Olivia to share her passion at the presentation I'd given and she went down a storm. She was very articulate and passionate.  She made such an impression in fact that they invited her to interview the Moderator Rev Dr David Bruce on Climate Sunday.  You can watch that video below.

The very fact that students were gathering and started to campaign on social media, using #DivestPCI as a campaign slogan seemed to strike a chord. The Presbyterian Church in Ireland knew the winds had changed, it was time to act on divestment.

To act they did!  It was decisive and meaningful. Within a few months the PCI had sold their shares in BP and divested their directly held investments in fossil fuels.

This means that all four of the major churches in Ireland have taken major steps forward on climate action - moving millions of pounds out of fossil fuels and into clean investments.

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