For the upper secondary school
„Climate justice“ has been on everyone’s lips since the powerful appearance of the „Fridays for future“ movement. In the context of the conciliar process for peace, justice and the integrity of creation, which was called for by the World Council of Churches at its General Assembly in 1983, Churches around the world have been dealing with issues relating to the connection between justice and the integrity of creation. In the context of the integrity of creation, the debate was initially dominated by issues of environmental pollution and the destruction of nature; in the context of justice, it was primarily focussed on the issue of social justice in the face of hunger and economic asymmetries between the Global North and the Global South. Since human-made climate change has become more widely recognised and the first serious consequences for people in the Global South and increasingly also in the global North are being felt, the connection between issues of global justice and climate change has also become clear and is being addressed under the term „climate justice“.
As the conciliar process shows, climate justice should not only be addressed in school subjects in the field of social sciences, but also in Religious Education. This is because questions of righteousness and peace, as well as the responsible treatment of God’s creation, are a fundamental part of the beliefs and teachings in various religions such as Christianity, Islam or Judaism. This means it fits well into the teaching of Religious Education whether that is in a context of non-denominational or denominational teaching. For the German mostly denominational context, one can state that these topics figure in all curricula whether that is Protestant, Catholic, Jewish or Muslim Religious Education. In the following, the didactic approach is laid out for Protestant Religious Education, but may well be adapted to other settings.
The lesson plan, this didactic commentary refers to, is based on the three steps of „recognise – apprehend – act“ and thus takes into account that understanding and awareness must first be gained and then put into practice. As a lesson plan for Christian religious education, the first step is to work with a biblical reference. The students deepen their knowledge of biblical prophets and get familiar with the concepts of justice and righteousness (especially in the First Testament). Then, they learn about the meaning of water from a biblical perspective and link it to their knowledge of water and water resources. Using materials from the German Protestant development agency ‘Bread for the world’, the students learn about the problematic situation of Bangladesh, which is particularly affected by climate change, and deal with the climate lawsuit brought before the German Federal Constitutional Court by Bangladeshi lawyer Yi Yi Prue.
Finally, the students take a stand on justice and righteousness in relation to water and climate justice and discuss practical consequences for their personal everyday lives and the entire global community.