Church bells throughout Ireland joined in a wave of ringing bells that embraced the globe on 13th December.
At the end of an ecumenical service in the Lutheran Cathedral in Copenhagen, the Dean of the Cathedral Anders Gadegaard introduced the ringing of the bells. At that time – 3pm – throughout Denmark, Scandinavia and Central Europe, thousands of church bells rang 350 times to symbolise the 350 parts per million that, according to many scientists, is the safe upper limit for CO2 in the atmosphere.
Around the world churches joined in a global chain of prayers and bell-ringing for climate justice. Starting in Fiji, in the South Pacific, it sounded throughout the world’s time zones to Copenhagen, on to Greenland, right around the earth and back to the Pacific.
Accelerating arctic warming and other early climate impacts have led scientists to conclude that we are already above the safe zone at our current 390ppm, and that unless we are able to rapidly return to 350 ppm this century, we risk reaching tipping points and irreversible impacts such as the melting of the Greenland ice sheet and major methane releases from increased permafrost melt.
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