OUR ISSUES
CLIMATE JUSTICE
Climate change is a meteorological phenomenon, but its policy urgency stems largely from its impacts on human communities. People around the world, including in Texas, already are feeling the impacts of a changing climate. These impacts fall disproportionately on individuals and communities who are least resilient to them, creating imperatives for policies that are rooted in deeply held, widely shared beliefs about our responsibility to each other.
ECONOMIC JUSTICE
Economic justice refers to the way we design the systems through which each person earns a living; enters into contracts; exchanges goods and services with others; and otherwise produces a material foundation for their physical sustenance. Economic justice is the area of public policy where tension between “charity” and “justice is most often apparent. The world’s faith communities share deep commitment both to the charitable alleviation of suffering stemming from imperfect economic systems, and to policy advocacy for realignment of those systems to achieve justice.
HUMAN RIGHTS
Human rights are rights we have merely because we exist as human beings. They are inherent to all people, regardless of nationality, sex, national or ethnic origin, color, religion, language, or any other status. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which the United Nations General Assembly adopted in 1948, establishes a modern framework for linking public policy and law to the theological and moral tenets shared across the world’s faith traditions.
CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
Free, fair elections, including the right of every citizen to cast a ballot that is duly counted, form the bedrock of American democracy. Voting rights are referred to as “the right preservative of all others,” since only through voting can the people of a community peaceably remove leaders who seek to oppress them. The world’s faith traditions collectively affirm voting as a responsibility both civic and spiritual: through voting, we express our preferences for the circumstances our neighbors will live in.