Feature story
The forums were held in Brasília, Brazil under the theme “Leave No One Behind: The Well-Being of the Planet and Its People.”
The global gathering brought together 300 representatives from a diverse array of stakeholders, including representatives from World Council of Churches (WCC), various faith and Indigenous traditions, civil society organisations, governments, multilateral entities, academia, and developmental experts.
The forums will submit recommendations the 2024 G20 Summit, which will be held under the Presidency of Brazil on 18-19 November, in Rio de Janeiro.
Each year since 2014, the G20 Interfaith Forum has convened in the G20 host country prior to the summit, bringing hundreds of faith leaders from around the world to discuss issues relevant to the G20 process. This is the first year in which the G20 Interfaith Forum and International Partnership on Religion and Sustainable Development Forum have been held jointly.
Priority issues
The Brazilian G20 Presidency 2024 has identified three priority issues: promoting the establishment of a new Global Alliance Against Hunger and Poverty; addressing climate change; and reforming global governance, including addressing structural reforms in the UN Security Council.
The G20 Interfaith Forum and International Partnership on Religion and Sustainable Development Forum voiced their wishes to be part of these emerging plans, particularly in light of the upcoming 2025 UN Climate Change Conference that will convene in November 2025 in Brazil.
Amid the challenges
The WCC and its partners began their discussions with a stark acknowledgement that their work is occurring in a world stricken with many crises.
In an opening message, His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I noted that we are living in and directly witnessing troubled times when peace and security as well as balance and sustainability are under imminent threat.
“We see unfolding before our eyes the suffering of innocent people and the devastation of natural resources,” he said. “We see it among laborers and students, among citizens and migrants. Faith leaders and religious communities can no longer be silent before such violation of human life.”
Ending hunger
Many discussions in the forums focused on ways to enhance food security and end hunger.
Peter Prove, WCC director for the Commission of the Churches on International Affairs, during a panel on "Religious engagement on food security,” shared the “Ten Commandments of Food,” which include commandments such as giving thanks for the food you eat, eating food grown as close as possible to where you live, striving for all people to have access to affordable and nutritious food, and more.
In closing remarks, Prove thanked the Brazilian government for its commitment and engagement in the process.
“We have heard repeatedly in this conference that hunger can be ended, that hunger is in effect a consequence of political choices,” he said. “We want to come alongside this global alliance. We want to be part of it. We want to participate and amplify and strengthen it.”
Prove also emphasized that several important discussions have emphasized mental health and psychosocial issues. “I think this is one of the areas that is really fundamental and has been poorly recognized in previous years, but is increasingly coming to the forefront and being recognized as a fundamental driver of human wellbeing and development,” he said. “I think it would be appropriate for us to continue the momentum of addressing this issue and finding ways in which this tidal wave of mental heath issues and psychosocial challenges can be addressed through the agency of faith actors.”
Before the forums, a working group of the WCC Commission of the Churches on Health and Healing released a message “A call for cross-generational action on the Mental Health of Youth.”
Interfaith Rainforest Initiative
The WCC is also part of the Interfaith Rainforest Initiative, and continues to express solidarity for policies that expand global actions and national financial support.
During the forums, the Interfaith Rainforest Initiative released a policy briefing that put forth ideas to promote healthy rainforests.
“The Interfaith Rainforest Initiative offers two opportunities to focus on and spur action: first, by grounding broad discussions in the national and local realities of Brazil’s Amazon basin; and second, by highlighting the central but often ignored roles – actual and potential – that religious leadership, modeling of approaches, and partnerships with other actors play in addressing the climate crisis,” reads the briefing. “The 2024 G20 summit’s location in Brazil shines a spotlight on the imperative of protecting rainforests as a priority for climate action.”
Plans for decentralising
During a general assembly of the members of the International Partnership on Religion and Sustainable Development Forum, Dinesh Suna, coordinator of the WCC Ecumenical Water Network, moderated a discussion on future work streams of that forum.
“With increased pressure on localisation, government member participation, and a financial resource crunch, the International Partnership on Religion and Sustainable Development Forum is exploring possibilities of decentralising its operations from a secretariat based in Germany,” Suna explained.
