In September 2025, Christian Climate Action, published a challenge to the Church to Stop Crucifying Creation!  This is the last of four Advent reflections arising from this Visionary document. 

In the fourth week of Advent we turn our thoughts to Mary. 

Things did not play out for Mary the way she would have imagined they would. She surely had no inkling that she would find herself giving birth, among strangers a long way from home and not even able to return home afterwards. 

There were no half way measures for Mary. Being pregnant, before marriage, after talking to an angel.. is quite a leap in the dark. She survives the birth, despite being away from family and pretty tired after a long journey. The safe arrival of the baby and survival of his mother would have been cause for relief and gratitude but it is a far cry from the cosy scenes we see on Christmas cards. There would have been blood and pain and crying and fear. Infant and maternal mortality would have been high. 

When Mary takes the baby to the temple as required, she hears the ominous words “This child is destined to cause the falling and rising of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be spoken against, so that the thoughts of many hearts will be revealed. And a sword will pierce your own soul too.”

We know Mary took time to think and pray. She must have been open to God in some way to be visited by the angel in the first place and we hear that after the shepherds came Mary “treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart” 

We may have had ideas about how our lives and those of our children would pan out. They probably included living in a stable climate with four seasons, with a safe place to live and a wide variety of food available to eat, with clean water, jobs, education, health care and all the things we have become accustomed to. 

Like Mary, our lives are not going to be as we had imagined they would be. So, in these times, when we are facing up to climate breakdown, speaking out and taking nonviolent direct action we need also to get back to the roots of our faith.

Our Church’s response to the Climate and Nature Crisis needs to be based on the radical foundational Christian practices of prayer, confessing our failings and building loving community. 

Our prayerful approach needs to be one where we, like Mary, ‘treasure up all these things and ponder them in our hearts. If we do this, it will lead us to recognise our historic role in colonialism which has ultimately led to climate disaster for brothers and sisters in other parts of the world. 

We will come to a place where we acknowledge the perspectives and practices that have brought us to this point, in which we have all participated, harming ourselves, others and ecosystems around us, endangering the very future of life on earth, and we will repent, not only as individuals but as  the church.

If we are granted ‘time for amendment of life’ we will seek to change how we live. 

With eyes open and hearts and minds acknowledging the truth of the gravity of the situation, we will take responsibility for being informed about those devastated by climate impacts and to continue to support the work of international aid agencies, and build strong direct links between UK churches and churches in climate crisis-stricken areas to maximise opportunities to offer love and assistance. 

At Christmas our eyes turn to a refugee family, forced to remain away from their family as it is unsafe for them to return home. They live in a land which is not their own, moving more than once until it is safe for them to go back. The Climate Crisis is already creating refugees; do we look at them and see in them the Holy Family? Do we stand up for them and welcome them as we would Mary, Joseph and Jesus? 

We will need to be a place of love and sanctuary for all victims of the Climate Crisis from the United Kingdom and overseas, offering spiritual, practical and financial support. 

Mary did what needed to be done, nothing complicated, just following God’s leading, loving, caring and keeping the family together as they moved multiple times. 

She accepted what she was tasked with saying with her actions as well as her words, ‘Let it be to me according to your word’ 

The climate crisis is going to make life progressively harder – we will face food shortages, water shortages, extreme weather events and quite possibly authoritarian regimes, wars and civil unrest. 

As the Church we need to start practising now the New Testament principles of sharing and holding things in common – knowledge, skills, time and resources – drawing communities together, supporting individuals to reduce their environmental impact and seeking liberation from excess consumerism. 

As the Church, we can model a society which offers genuine hope in uncertain times with love abounding to sustain courageous and generous action. 

It is here we will find joy, the same joy which inspired Mary to sing the song we now know to be the Magnificat, a song of gratitude at being given such an important piece of work to do. We live in exciting and challenging times. As we take on the work we have been given, may we also share in Mary’s joy.

If you’re ready to get back to where the church came from and practise radical love, prayer, sharing and action read Stop Crucifying Creation  and share it with your church, general and diocesan synods for prayer, discussion and in order to formulate a response. And join Christian Climate Action in an an online meeting on Wednesday 28^th January 2026 to see where we go next. 

This is the third of four reflections. Read the first here. Ready the second here. Read the third here.