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Community story: “Green” transition—or “greed” transition?
Sweden, as with many countries in the European Union, has a problem with plastic pollution – one of three intersecting global crises threatening the planet (the other two being climate change and biodiversity loss). Plastic waste, particularly on the Swedish west coast, has become a serious issue over the years. Both wind and ocean currents bring large amounts of plastic debris to the shores of this beautiful coast, affecting water quality as well as endangering fish, seabirds, and other living beings that have the oceans as their habitat. The plastic breaks down in the ocean into microplastics, entering the cells of species that live in the ocean, and when we eat fish, we also get microplastics in our bodies.
What is perhaps less recognised is that the plastic and oil industries are intimately connected. Up to 98% of single use plastics are made from fossil fuels and the world’s top 7 plastic producing companies are all fossil fuel companies. Plastics are very much a part of the fossil fuel economy that is driving climate change.
Sweden itself has limited fossil fuel reserves. It imports the bulk of its oil from neighbouring Norway, where a group of young people and Indigenous Sami have sued the Norwegian state, arguing that continued expansion of oil and gas projects will accelerate climate impacts, violating their rights to a clean and healthy environment.
As Sweden transitions away from fossil fuels, another extractive industry is re-surging. More than 60 years ago, community protests over safety and environmental impacts brought to a halt uranium mining in southwest Sweden to power nuclear plants. Fragile ecosystems were protected for decades. Fast forward to today: the Swedish government has lifted a ban on uranium mining and mining companies are actively searching for rare earth metals. Some say this is part of the “green transition.” But with mining’s well-known risks to water and ecosystems, the “green transition” looks more like a “greed transition” – where businesses are rebranded as sustainable while old practices of harming communities and the environment continue.
In particular, the recent discovery of a rare earth ore deposit in Kiruna in Northern Sweden has been hailed as a tremendous economic boon that state and private companies are eager to exploit. However, the deposit lies directly along the Gábna Sami community’s centuries-old reindeer migration corridor. For the Sami people, the impending loss of land and reindeer migration access is a threat not only to the animals that provide their livelihoods, but also to Sami cultural identity and even survival.
Biblical reflection: do we love wealth or do we love life?
He who loves money will not be satisfied with money, nor he who loves wealth with his income; this also is vanity. (Ecclesiastes 5:10)
Wealth accumulation is the unquestioned driving force behind the plastics crisis, destructive rare earth extraction, and climate emergency. Plastic production, oil production, and mining are often masked with arguments that these economic activities will bring benefits to all: jobs, energy security, and even “green development.” Time and again, this has been proven wrong. Indigenous communities that depend on land and oceans and thousands of species face the immediate consequences of loss of livelihoods and habitat. A “theology of enough” must be formulated against the madness that is sometimes presented as “green development.”
The global fossil fuel economy goes hand in hand with a system that concentrates wealth in the hands of the few. Even though we know through science that fossil fuel combustion poses a profound threat to the climate and therefore to life-in-creation, their extraction is expanding – driven largely by the pursuit of profit. In 2024, 585 of the world’s largest and most polluting fossil fuel companies made USD 583 billion in profits, nearly a 70% increase from 2019.
Equally troubling is that the so-called “green development” can be guided by the same logic. Some large-scale climate-related projects including in Nordic countries are motivated less by concern for our shared future and more by financial gain. Mining in the name of “green transition” is a case in point. These industries also tend to move to places where extraction is easier: where communities have limited power to resist, where legal protections are weak, and where people’s daily lives are already marked by scarcity. From such places, resources can be removed and sold to wealthier societies – including to those who might have opposed extraction if it affected their own backyards. When the social and environmental costs are hidden from view, consumers can enjoy the benefits of extractive industries with a clear conscience, often remaining unaware – or choosing to remain unaware – of the realities behind the products they use.
In this season of Lent, we must ask ourselves: Where is our heart? Do we love wealth or do we love life? As it is said in Matthew 6:19-21: “Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moths and vermin destroy, and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where moths and vermin do not destroy, and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” As people of faith and as a society, where is our treasure today? Where is our heart today? How might we, together, learn to live with “enough” so that all may have life in dignity?
Personal action, community action
This 2nd week of Lent, we invite you as part of the Global Systemic Carbon Fast to refrain from using single-use plastic bags and to recycle plastics.
Some of the plastic waste along Sweden’s West Coast was used to build the Cathedral of Hope (Håpets Katedral) in Norway. Constructed on a barge and open to all faiths, the Håpets Cathedral visited Strömstad, a small Swedish municipality. In this space, under a mystical light, seminars on environmental concerns were organised, bringing marine scientists, politicians, faith leaders and representatives from civil society. This created an atmosphere of dialogue and openness that lives on in the Strömstad Parish. Made out of recycled plastics, the cathedral, particularly its roof, has 50 different colours, reflecting beauty in diversity. But it also serves as a powerful reminder of the possibility to renew and transform what is pollutive and destructive into something beautiful, something that brings together all stakeholders to discuss and promote the protection and flourishing of life.
While we commit to restrict the use of single-use and to recycle plastics, we are reminded that there is a larger oil and gas industry to reckon with. Christian discipleship does not end with the personal but opens up to collective action and public witness. In this light, faith is lived within the concrete realities of people and the whole of creation. The Lenten fast is more than a personal devotion: it is a shared expression of discipleship and responsibility, a commitment to justice and the flourishing of life, through which we discern together what “enough” means in practice. People of faith and churches are called to stand in solidarity with communities whose lands and livelihoods are affected by extractive economies.
Therefore, we also invite you, your congregation and your church to join the campaign for a Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty. Complementing the Paris Agreement, the treaty offers a global roadmap to halt the expansion of fossil fuels, manage an equitable phase-out of coal, oil and gas, and lay the foundations for a true just energy transition in which no worker, community or country is left behind. Faith-based organisations, including the World Council of Churches, have endorsed the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty. We invite you to do the same through this link.
