A “Brief” History of the Fossil Fuel Divestment Campaign in the PCUSA

 

by Fred Milligan

 2011 Following the Church of Sweden’s 2009 decision to begin divesting its fossil fuel stocks, U.S. climate activists and university students in West Virginia and elsewhere began to take notice. Bill McKibben’s 350.org group amplified these local actions by launching a nationwide divestment effort.

 2012 McKibben’s 21-stop Do The Math tour spans the country, calling on colleges, religious institutions, and pension funds to liquidate their fossil fuel stocks to stigmatize the industry and accelerate the transition to clean energy. Inspired by his Nov 10 stop in Palo Alto, First Presbyterian Church of Palo Alto’s Cool Planet team begins drafting what becomes the first Presbyterian overture calling for categorical divestment from fossil fuels.

 2013 After learning about divestment at the Forward on Climate rally in February, Dan Terpstra and Wil Howie contact Rebecca Barnes of the Presbyterian Hunger Program, who connects them with Abby Mohaupt and the Palo Alto group. They, along with others, refine the draft overture and begin developing the national network that becomes Fossil Free PCUSA.

 2014 Presbytery of Boston and the newly formed Fossil Free PCUSA brought the first divestment overture, with a dozen concurrences, to that year’s General Assembly. It is referred by committee in a hotly contested 30-29 vote to MRTI for consideration through its normal processes of engagement. A minority report was presented to plenary by members of the committee and, after extended debate, was defeated in deference to the original committee referral.

Pictured:(left to right) Advocates for the 2014 Overture: Susan Chamberlain, Sue Smith, Dan Terpstra, Megan Gregory, abby mohaupt, Paul Henschen, Peter Anderson, Rob Mark, Pam McVety, Jacob Bolton

 2016 The Presbytery of San Francisco and FFPCUSA’s overture is brought to that G.A., along with 29 concurring presbyteries, and narrowly clears the committee by a vote of 31 to 25. In a minority report brought by MRTI, an alternative resolution is proposed and adopted by the assembly which defers to the “proven track record of MRTI’s engagement processes.” This is the year that PEC gave First Pres Palo Alto an award for divestment work.

 2018 Hudson River Presbytery and Fossil Free PCUSA (now receiving organizational support from Presbyterian Peace Fellowship) bring an overture to GA.supported by forty (40) presbyteries (the most ever for one overture). Although the G.A. committee approves an amended version of the overture, the plenary votes to replace it with a minority report backed by MRTI and the board of pensions, which eliminates the full divestment option. This alternative resolution is then amended to call for focused engagement and deadlines for action on five specific companies.

 2020 G.A. does not meet due to the COVID pandemic. However, in the lead-up to the 2020 General Assembly, Monmouth Presbytery and Fossil Free PCUSA organize the sponsorship and concurrence of thirty Presbyteries for their simply named “On Fossil Fuel Divestment” overture. Action on this overture is referred to the 2022 assembly.

 2022 MRTI brings five companies to G.A. for divestment, but the divestment overture referred from the 2020 assembly (ENV-07) fails once again to pass. Another small victory comes in the form of ACSWP’s Advice and Counsel Comment (originally submitted to the 2020 GA, along with their “Investing in a Green Future” statement), supporting passage of ENV-07 and the full divestment for which it calls. Their specific language is that passage of full fossil fuel divestment will represent . . . 

 “an ethical statement that as a Christian denomination we understand our calling from Genesis to care for creation. Investing in fossil fuels is an equity issue as well - pollution has a more detrimental effect on vulnerable and marginalized communities.” .  . . They continue, “Believing an economy is possible without fossil fuels can start with divesting from these companies that provide fossil fuels.”

 2022 proves to be a watershed moment in the divestment journey, with PEC authoring its first divestment overture and many previously involved with FFPCUSA stepping back from the struggle. However, neither the PEC-authored overture, sponsored by Susquehanna Valley Presbytery (ENV-08), nor (ENV-07) mentioned above, passed. Instead, the G.A. committee, with assistance from MRTI staff and board members and Board of Pensions Staff, combine elements of each of the divestment overtures into another measure, creating a general expression of concern for the environment and the usage of fossil fuels, saying . . .

  “We must continue towards a way of life divested from fossil fuels both monetarily and in our daily living.”

 2024 PEC had stepped up to leadership of the fossil fuel divestment effort in 2022 and engaged with full force in late 2023, writing and distributing yet another divestment overture for the 226th G.A. in Salt Lake City. With concurrences from seventeen Presbyteries there is once again significant support from across the church for the position being consistently argued since 2014 and echoed in the 2020/22 ACSWP comment cited above.

 However, ACSWP chooses to retreat from its 2020/22 support for divestment continued opposition from some advocacy groups, MRTI’s staff and Board members (who bring divestment recommendations for zero-fossil-fuel companies), the overture passed through the committee without amendment. This, alongside an MRTI report that has been amended, the committee moderators assure, sufficiently to remove any conflicts between the two items of business.

 When the measure comes before the Plenary business session it passes with a sizable majority of commissioners voting in favor. However, upon returning from lunch, the moderator of the Environmental Justice Committee informs the assembly that the overture they had passed in the morning is incommensurate with the version of the MRTI report that had been passed by the committee and that therefore more amendments are needed. During the resulting debate,  the divestment overture passed in the morning session is reconsidered and voted down in favor of an amendment to the MRTI report that adds ten fossil fuel companies for immediate divestment. A similar result to what had been achieved in 2018 except this time the decision was for immediate divestment, circumventing the engagement process. But once again, the push for full fossil fuel divestment is thwarted. This is the GA that called for a redo of the divestment criteria through a task force. The task force’s report in 2026 was passed unanimously and makes it possible for categorical divestment.

 

Pictured: PEC Advocacy Committee Co-facilitator and Overture Advocate, Rev. Fred Milligan and YAAD Drew Hill who had served on the Environmental Justice Committee in a photo taken shortly after the Assembly Plenary had passed the categorical divestment overture, ENV-02 at the 226th GA in 2024.

2026 With the U.S. government’s withdrawal from the UNFCCC Paris Accords and annual COP process, an increasing denigration of climate science, and numerous other measures, the political winds of widespread resistance to climate denialism are beginning to stir in the country. While the Church has, for decades, acknowledged that climate change is real and human-caused, many are convinced that there is an “urgency denialism” embedded in the commitment to the excruciatingly slow engagement process. This is particularly felt among younger members. Beginning in early 2025, the PEC Advocacy Committee, with support from the PEC Steering Committee, had launched the organization of what would soon call itself the Creation Action Network of Presbyterian Young Adults (CANOPY), with the aim of providing this segment of the Church’s membership with a stronger voice in the conversation about how we address matters of Climate and Environmental Justice. The next overture development team included all three strands of the effort to date: Pam McVety from the former FFPCUSA group, Fred Milligan from PEC, and Drew Hill from CANOPY.

 This team began regular consultations with the staff and new leadership of MRTI, the staff and membership of the Advocacy Groups, and members of ACSWP. Although these meetings were congenial, there was no indication of what level of opposition, if any, might be encountered at the assembly. The team continued to hear concerns that any call for sector-level (i.e., categorical) divestment be approached in a way that would be “implementable” by our fiduciaries, who have created many barriers to such implementation.

 Much to the surprise of the divestment advocates, ACSWP once again chooses to recommend approval of the divestment recommendations in the overture. In addition, they offer, on their own volition, a nuanced policy statement in the form of the paper “Intent, Effect, Haste: Ethical Guidance on Fossil Fuels,” which argues for a rapid removal of investments in fossil fuels. In contrast with past G.A.s, none of the Advocacy Groups choose to write a comment, and perhaps most importantly, MRTI testifies before the committee that the divestment overture represents no conflict with their own recommendations.

 With only a couple of minor, friendly amendments, the overture passes on a 53-11 vote and is placed, along with all other items of CLJ business, on the Plenary’s Consent Agenda, where it passes by voice vote in the very first session of business. There is a bit of anxiety in the afternoon before the session begins when the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship issues a call for the MRTI report to be voted down, but after consultation between PEC/CANOPY and PPF leaders, and issuance of a statement of support for passage of the overture by MRTI’s leadership and assurance of PEC/CANOPY’s support for passage of MRTI’s report, the PPF call was withdrawn. And the rest, as the saying goes, history.

 It remains to be seen how quickly our fiduciaries will act. The current process requires MRTI to research and present the list of companies to the next assembly, but the overture timeline offers the possibility of spreading the divestment over four or more years, as required by “fiduciary responsibility.”

 Fortunately, the committee amended the overture to require reporting at the next two assemblies by MRTI and the fiduciaries to indicate the speed of progress.

 We want to especially offer a word of thanks to the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship for all they have contributed to this effort across the years and right through the most recent General Assembly including their presentation of the 2025 “Peaceseeker Award” to PEC for our work on Divestment and initiating the organization of CANOPY.

 

Rev. Fred Milligan, H.R. is the Co-Facilitator for PEC's Advocacy Committee. He has been involved with PEC since 2005 when he served on the General Assembly staff as Associate for Stewardship Education and supported the start-up of the Eco-Stewards program.

Planting Charity and Growing Justice

 

by Derrick Weston

 In 2019, while I was living in Baltimore, I worked with HopeSprings, a ministry that equipped congregations to work with people living with HIV. Part of the work involved partnering to provide healthy meals to folks living with the illness. As a gardening enthusiast, I proposed shortening the food distribution chain by growing some of what we provided to our clients. One of our partner congregations told us about a community garden that might suit our needs. The Rockrose garden had been planted over a former quarry (“rock rows”) and became a place where community members could adopt a plot and grow their own food. A sizeable portion of the area was designated as the “charity garden,” and I was given access to begin pursuing my wildest urban farm dreams. That was in the winter of 2019.

 The pandemic hit just as I was beginning to plan for spring planting. The garden hadn’t been tended for some time. It was very overgrown, with some of the most stubborn weeds I’ve ever encountered. What’s more, I was on a deadline. The woman who used to tend the space moved to Florida, but she still wanted to stay involved. Her plan was to start dozens and dozens of sweet potato slips, which she would then ship from Florida to Baltimore. From there, it would be a mad dash to get them into the ground before they wilted or rotted. Hindsight being what it is, I now realize this was insane. But after a few weeks of being cooped up indoors, weeding a half-acre by hand and rushing to get a plant I was unfamiliar with in the dirt felt like an escape.

 By the grace of God, one church showed up for me in a big way. I was friends with a woman who, at the time, was the associate pastor of Brown Memorial Presbyterian Church. She mobilized a group of volunteers who were as stir-crazy as I was in the early COVID period. Every day, a new bunch of volunteers of all ages showed up to weed and mow the area. When the sweet potato slips finally arrived, we raced the clock together to get them into the ground. We lost some to rot, but the overwhelming majority of the tiny plants weathered their interstate trek, none the worse for wear.

 We rejoiced on the day we planted the last sweet potato, then realized we still had plenty of space to play with, “play” being the operative word here. There was no blueprint to follow. We began imagining what the space could become. We planted greens, squash, tomatoes, and carrots. We began cleaning out an abandoned hoop house, already dreaming about the next season. We planted pollinators along the fenceline. As the months passed, we connected with other organizations addressing the spike in hunger caused by the pandemic and started donating what we grew. We worked with Govans Presbyterian Church to provide produce for their weekly meal, which opened its doors to all in the community.

 Largely through the efforts of a volunteer named McKay Jenkins, the space took on a life of its own. We maintained a regular rotation of volunteers, and we also hosted classrooms and community groups seeking ways to contribute during that uncertain season. We invited congregations not only to volunteer but also to worship in the space. Something had shifted for us, and the space became holy ground. We were never happy with the “charity garden” label. By the next year, McKay began referring to it as the Rockrose Food Justice Project.

 Six years later, the space still provides food and educational experiences, but it also offers something more. Tucked away in what feels like an urban oasis, where you are surrounded by trees yet can still hear the interstate, the former quarry provides a sense of community and purpose. You feel it as you enter, a sense that a small part of God’s dream for humans and Creation is coming true. Certainly there are struggles: being dependent on the city for water during dry seasons, rising urban temperatures that have already shifted our growing windows in this short time, and figuring out exactly how to co-exist with groundhogs who think we’re planting just for them. Despite all of that, it is a space where I feel most like myself. In Genesis 2, God charges the human formed from the earth to give back to the earth from which he came. I’ve never felt more connected to that mandate than in our little slice of urban agrarianism.

 

Derrick Weston is the director of theological education and formation at Creation Justice Ministries and a steering committee member of Presbyterians for Earth Care living near Pittsburgh, PA.

The House That Lives: Lessons from an Alaskan Bioshelter

 

Several PEC members toured the Yukon from Fairbanks to Anchorage, led by Rev. Curtis Karns, EP of Yukon Presbytery, and his amazing crew from the Presbytery.

The tour included Curt and Cindee’s amazing and one-of-a-kind, home which they had designed.  (They have since moved, but I am grateful for their hospitality and continued ministry in both social and environmental justice.). Curt was a previous member of the Steering Committee of PEC.  PEC continues to appreciate their work greatly. 

Most people think of a house as a shelter—a place that protects us from the weather while consuming water, energy, and other resources. But tucked into the hillside of Eagle River, Alaska, stands a home that turns that idea upside down. Known as EcoEscape, this remarkable bioshelter was designed to function as a living organism, collecting its own water, recycling its own waste, growing food, and working with nature rather than against it.

Built in the early 1980s by Bob Crosby, EcoEscape began as an experiment. At the time, many rural Alaskan communities lacked modern water and sewer systems. Residents often carried water from lakes or rivers and disposed of waste in so-called “honey buckets.” Installing conventional infrastructure in remote areas was—and remains—staggeringly expensive because of permafrost, rugged terrain, and small populations. In some villages, the cost of installing a modern sewer system has exceeded $50,000 per household toilet. Crosby believed there had to be a better way. Using mostly off-the-shelf materials available from ordinary hardware stores, he created a home-scale water and waste management system for a fraction of that cost.

Years later, Curt and Cindee Karns discovered the unusual house while searching online for environmentally friendly homes. Purchasing it proved difficult because it lacked both a conventional well and septic system, making lenders reluctant to finance it. After successfully persuading the Alaska Housing Finance Corporation to approve a mortgage, they moved into the home in 2008 and continued its mission as a place for education, tours, and environmental workshops.

What makes EcoEscape extraordinary is not exotic building materials or futuristic technology. The house itself is surprisingly conventional. Its walls are wood-framed with standard insulation, its windows are double-paned, and most of its fixtures are familiar to any homeowner. The innovation lies in how the home’s systems work together.

The Karns often described the bioshelter as if it were a living creature. “The house breathes, drinks, digests, and, since we can’t process urine, it pees,” Cindee explained. That simple description captures the philosophy behind the design: every output becomes an input for another part of the system.

Instead of relying on a well, EcoEscape collects rainwater and snowmelt from its roof. Two 5,000-gallon cisterns store the water, one inside the house and another nearby. The primary cistern is more than a storage tank. Filled with gravel, aquatic plants, and koi, it functions as a miniature ecosystem. Fish waste nourishes the plants, while the plants help clean the water. The koi also serve as an early warning system. If someone accidentally introduces a harmful chemical into the water, the fish are the first to react, alerting the homeowners before serious damage occurs. After passing through standard sediment and carbon filters, the water is clean enough for drinking.

Water is only borrowed, never wasted. Water from sinks, showers, and laundry flows through settling tanks populated by beneficial aerobic bacteria that naturally break down contaminants. After several days of treatment, ultraviolet light disinfects the water before it is safely returned to the environment. The system requires only modest maintenance, and its components are readily available from local hardware stores.

Even human waste becomes a resource. Composting toilets send waste into rotating drums where bacteria and red wiggler worms slowly convert it into compost. After nearly two years of decomposition and additional outdoor curing, the material becomes fertile soil that nourishes gardens both inside and outside the home. Kitchen scraps join the same cycle, creating a nearly closed-loop system in which very little is discarded.

The bioshelter also makes excellent use of Alaska’s limited sunlight. Its south-facing glass solarium captures solar energy throughout the day, warming the space while providing an ideal environment for plants. Warm air is circulated throughout the house using a heat recovery ventilation system, reducing the need for supplemental heating. A masonry fireplace provides additional warmth during the coldest weather, while a backup natural gas furnace is used primarily for hot water. Even in winter, the heat stored in the home’s large water cistern helps keep the solarium warm enough for both plants and fish to survive.

When the Karns purchased the property, they expanded its environmental mission by introducing permaculture principles. They added rooftop gardens, planted fruit trees, and began constructing a greenhouse using natural building materials. Their goal was to demonstrate not only sustainable living, but also sustainable food production in one of North America’s most challenging climates.

Yet perhaps the most valuable lesson of EcoEscape is not technological at all.

In a later reflection written after they left the home, Curt and Cindee acknowledged that despite 15 years of living lightly on the planet, hosting tours, teaching classes, and inspiring thousands of visitors, global environmental problems have continued to worsen. They wondered whether their efforts had made any difference.

Their answer was both humble and hopeful: perhaps they planted a seed.

That may be the true legacy of EcoEscape. Its greatest achievement is not simply demonstrating that a house can recycle water, compost waste, or grow food. It shows that sustainable living is possible using practical, understandable systems rather than expensive, high-tech solutions. While no single home can solve climate change, each one can become an example that inspires others to rethink how they live.

As communities everywhere search for ways to conserve water, reduce waste, and build resilience in a changing climate, the lessons from this remarkable Alaskan bioshelter remain as relevant today as they were more than forty years ago. Sometimes the most powerful environmental innovations are not the largest or most expensive. Sometimes they begin with a single house—and the people willing to imagine that it could live as gently on the Earth as the ecosystem surrounding it.

ADDENDUM to the Bioshelter story 

 

In reality, there were 31 steps to arrive at the front door of our mountain home and we weren’t getitng any younger. We chose to move back home to Fairbanks in retirement where  all of our siblings/parents live. Since moving back and leaving the bioshelter to new  caretakers/owners who have not kept up with all of the bioshelter’s systems, Curt and I have  returned to a regular American lifestyle. We moved into a log house heated by fossil fuel  (propane and oil). We have three flush toilets and we recycle the best that we can just like  everyone else. For 15 years we lived lightly on the planet, we invited countless people into our  home to see it, we had students from all over the country see it via zoom, built a straw/clay  greenhouse heated with a rocket stove as well as an attached sauna built from cord wood. As  the tours came through people would oohh and ahhhh and talk about how very cool it was  and how they wished they had that house. We learned and taught permaculture, taught classes, engaged  groups, pushed a no-waste lifestyles. And with all of that, not much has changed as a result of  living in our living house. The country and world’s population continues to rise, the country’s leaders won’t change our trajectory, the pollution continues to worsen, everything is melting and warming faster  than ever. 

 

In reality all we can hope is that we planted a small seed somewhere. We shake our heads and  can’t believe that humanity is very similar to the reindeer on St. Mathhew’s island, who left to  their own devices, ate all the food on the island and starved to death. Or the man who sat on  his roof and prayed for God to help him in the flood while he waved off the rescue boat and  the rescue helicopters, being so sure that “God will save me.” But when he got to heaven and  asked God why God didn’t save him, God said, “I sent boats and helicopters, what did you  want God tells us almost daily of the plight of the planet in different ways, yet we don’t  heed the warnings. We don’t curb our appetites. We consume. But we know it does not have  to be that way. 

 

**Curt continues to work on Citizen’s Climate Lobby and Cindee is working on Alaska’s Food  Security, both gearing up for the stresses: fires, storms, floods, etc. that are sure to come. 

Camille Dungy, Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden

 

Book Review by Courtenay Willcox

There are many ways to look at Camille Dungy’s book, Soil: The Story of a Black Mother’s Garden. You can look at it from the dirt, from her family: a Black family in a mostly white Midwestern town, from the people she encounters because of her gardens, from her writing and its process, from the specific plants she puts into the garden, from bunnies (you have to read the book), and from racism (again, you have to read the book). I was glad to take time to walk through Camille’s gardens, especially her last one. It gives me some hope for mine, which can seem weed-ridden and not nearly enough to fulfill my vision of a riot of color.

For the author, the diversity of her garden is a mirror held up to her community in Fort Collins, CO. She writes in 20-minute daily chunks about how diversity in a garden, in the larger world, and around issues of race and class yields the most robust product, garden, world, and human community. Diversity results in the most long-lasting, robust, strong product that is always in process and never finished.

Her words paint pictures as she writes about her seven-year endeavor to transform her iconic suburban lawn into a diverse, drought-resistant, pollinator's paradise. She brings together horticulture and environmental justice while weaving in race, motherhood, and the exclusion of Black voices from nature writing. The diversity of her garden, the diversity of race, and the diversity of creation are her medium, drawn from the soil and offering the most hope and promise as she and we all work to till and keep our creation.

This is worth your time. After you read it, be prepared to step outside into the dirt to plant or revise your garden, getting rid of some of your lawn in the process.

Courtenay Willcox is a transitional pastor at Northampton Presbyterian Church, Moderator of Presbyterians for Earth Care, and a very grateful Gigi to three remarkable granddaughters.