Sacred spaces, resilient places footsteps 2026 conference.
I would like to start sharing my connection with footsteps which started 7 years ago as a
community interfaith connector. Over the years I have gained insights through listening to faith communities and bringing people together for positive green climate action.
Every year footsteps, an interfaith group in Birmingham has its yearly conference bringing faith leaders, civic society and council leaders and community members together to share and work
together. With wild fires in Birmingham and flooding, climate change felt real and we all wanted to know what faith communities can do. I hope I can share some insights into the conference and what I learned.
Footsteps worked with 6 Birmingham city university architecture students to design 6 centres of climate adoption centres at places of worship, they were Niskham Centre, Bull street quakers, Clifton road mosque, Cotteridge church, St Christophers church and Bahu trust. The findings where really interesting depending on where the places where, such as Nishakam centre having most risk, poor levels of green space and high air pollution and Cotteridge church having a low risk overall and a low flood risk and medium for lack of open green spaces, this shows how even in birmingham, dependent upon where you are the risks are unique to you. It shows how important it is to have tailored support adoption measures as we will see as well as looking at more city wide measures too and a wider regional framework.
Connection with Retrofit Balsall heath for me its about trust and hearts and minds, its the people of faith and no faith coming together with shared values and care for people and planet, as well as seeking support and advice from experts such as Mecca trust, trusted in community and were able to help get over 400 people signed up to retrofit their homes. More than that, climate adoption from a faith community is about having every day feel with their every day needs such as job support and sign posting people to opportunities where they can get involved in their communities.
Its, the faith shared values and community spirit, a resilient attitude. Balsall heath is an
excellent example of climate adaptation at neighborhood level, it can and will do more, what it has shown is that faith can play its role in bringing people together and things get done when people take ownership of their communities. Examples from research- what can be done.
I will share one example that was shared which was at Niskham centre where improving nature around the site would help with adapting with climate such as roof to garden, planting and making use of outdoor spaces. This shows that right openness from faith leaders and backing from the community who can see the benefits if can be done, co creating the garden with the community and involving them at every stage is the best way for faith communities to take ownership. People do not want things done to them. I have learnt from my experiences and from listening to others at conferences, people have skills that they can share and bring to support the work and cross interfaith learning was also mentioned a lot.
In conclusion,as the conference came to close, the different tables recognised the invaluable
work faith communities already do in their communities, but felt more can be done to work
together and a good starting point was the faith climate adoption toolkit which footsteps are
creating which every faith community can use to help adopt and plan their individual action.
There was also a call for better support for funding as not all faith communities had the financial resources.
My experience over the years is that listening as well as understanding the
communities is critical and using tools such as whatsapp or youtube that meet the diverse
cultural needs. During the pandemic, messaging was critical but most importantly trust. The
people who were trusted in their respective communities were the best at supporting their
communities but they too needed support such as training and mentoring as well as having
teams behind them to carry out the work. As temperatures rise, what is the new normal? What have we learnt from the heat waves? If we do nothing it will not go away. If we try and do our best to adapt, we can at least say we tried.
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