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Celebrating the gift of water, with a sermon lifting up its spiritual significance—water is life!

Keynote Address
Barbara Boxer, four-term U.S. Senator, a national leader on environmental protection and water justice, will frame the challenges we face in this moment in history and how we can join together to protect the most vulnerable, both people and planet.

Session 1: “Water: Commons or Commodity?”
The United Nations has declared water as a human right. Global markets regard it as a commodity. Can a fresh approach to market capitalism serve the common good, or does the world need a new and different system of exchange?

Opening Talk: Maude Barlow, Blue Planet Project, “Our Right to Water”
Response: Christiana Zenner Peppard, Fordham University

Theatrical Response: original sketch by young performers
Video: Church of South India
Storytellers: Nakiya Wakes (Flint, Michigan), Brandon Mauai (Standing Rock, North Dakota), Winston Halapua (Fiji)

Session 2: The Global and the Local
As Hurricane Sandy demonstrated, New York City is vulnerable to sea rise and surge. Climate change is making matters worse. Speakers will examine New York’s issues as a model of how to examine local problems in light of global realities.

Opening Talk: Kim Stanley Robinson – Reading and commenting on his forthcoming novel New York 2140, an apocalyptic vision of the city after melting ice caps cause sea levels to rise.
Theatrical Response: original sketch by young performers
Video available to registered partners.

Panel response:
Moderator: Catherine McVay Hughes, former Manhattan Community Board One Chair
Panelists: William Golden – New York/New Jersey Storm Surge Working Group; Siobhan Collins – Manager, Water Program, CERES; Robert Freudenberg – Regional Plan Association (RPA)

Session 3: “What Churches Are Doing to Make a Difference”
People of faith are working for water justice all over the world. Speakers will talk in practical terms about the challenges and achievements, and we will examine what strategies lead to projects that truly improve people’s lives.

Opening Talk: Archbishop Thabo Makgoba - Speaking live from St. George’s Cathedral, Cape Town, South Africa
Q&A

Storytellers: Samuel Brannon (The Rio Grande) and Terese Corkish (The Great Barrier Reef – via Skype)
Video: La Iglesia Episcopal de Cuba
David Toomey, Ph.D. Development Economist and Director, Makana Consulting, Water Justice at Work; Strategies for Sustainable Water Access

Session 4: “Being Agents of Change”
As the conference closes, our work begins in earnest. Our speaker is a leading climate scientist who knows both the data on climate change and its impact and also the solutions that lead her to say “Together, we can fix this.”

Opening Talk: Katharine Hayhoe, climate scientist (Texas Tech), author
Q&A

Storytellers: Anne Kirori (Kenya – by video), Asif Iqbal (Pakistan), and Scott P. Lewis (Florida - via Skype)
Theatrical Response: original sketch by young performers
Community Reflection Closing