Advocacy
“Your Guardian-Lord Is God, who created the heavens and the earth in six Days, and is firmly established on the Throne (of authority). He draweth the night as a veil o’er the day, each seeking the other in rapid succession. He created the sun, the moon, and the stars, all governed by laws under His Command. Is it not His to create and to govern? Blessed be God, the Cherisher and Sustainer of the Worlds!” ~Quran S. VII, v. 54
Our moral reflection and personal behaviors matter a lot, if our religions are any guide (and at Faith in Place we believe that they are). But we don’t get to sufficient scale by modifying individual practices or even all our practices at the congregational level. We certainly want consistency of thought and deed, but to create solutions on the same scale as the problems our ecology faces, we’re going to need strong public policy advocacy.
Get Educated
Each year in the late winter, before the Illinois General Assembly session gets underway, Faith in Place holds its annual policy workshop. The workshop will outline the advocacy agenda we’ll be following for the year. Faith in Place is a member of the Illinois Environmental Council, and of the Illinois Climate Action Network (ICAN), both of which are collaborative efforts of most of the environmental groups working in the state. We coordinate our policy agenda with the groups that have a consistent presence in Springfield, so that we can keep you up to date on policy developments.
Get email alerts
Besides our monthly electronic newsletter, we have a special set of action alerts for those who want to be in our rapid response network. Sign up for that network and stay up-to-date on developments of the bills we are following at the state and federal level. We promise to keep you informed without overwhelming you, and to help you lead a more targeted, effective advocacy effort in your congregation.
Overview of current bills and fact sheets
Right now Faith in Place is supporting the federal climate bill (passed as the ACES bill out of the House earlier this year and currently facing an undetermined future in the Senate). A fact sheet on ACES is available for download, below, and up-to-date analysis of the climate legislation can be found at the link below the fact sheet.
Lobby Day
Every spring we participate in the Illinois Environmental Council lobby day in Springfield. This year Lobby Day is March 10 and we're going to be pushing for the RENEW Illinois solar package of legislation. You'll find fact sheets (from our friends at the Sierra Club) explaining the house and Senate versions of those bills at the events section of our website under the lobby day entry.
Postcards and in-district activity
Faith in Place does an annual postcard campaign, providing as many postcards as your congregation wants on a single critical issue. In 2009 we collected over 700 postcards for the state carbon cap proposal. We then arranged for members of our partner congregations to deliver the postcards to state representatives and senators in their district offices (generally by meeting with staff in those offices). This allows for direct advocacy by many more people than are able to attend the annual Lobby Day in Springfield. We're currently preparing our postcards for the RENEW proposal and will have them available soon.
Federal advocacy through Illinois Interfaith Power & Light
Our affiliation with the national Interfaith Power & Light organization informs our advocacy on federal issues. It also allows Faith in Place staff to attend the annual lobbying effort in Washington, DC, along with representatives of the faith community from across the country. Your support for a federal carbon cap is represented there through our participation in Interfaith Power & Light, and we will make sure that we visit the representatives of districts in which we have the greatest concentration of congregational partners.
Related Links
Union of Concerned Scientists - For up-to-date analysis of the American Clean Energy and Security Act, we suggest the webpage of our friends at the Union of Concerned Scientists.