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Flood waters in Gonaives, Haiti

Among the thousands of NGOs attending December's Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen was Sister Alfonsus, a Dominican nun from the north of London. She works with CAFOD, an organization working in the developing world and aiming to raise awareness among everyone about poverty and social justice. UN Radio's partner, Emily Benson of the Stakeholders Forum, caught up with Sister Alfonsus in Copenhagen to find out the source of her interest in the issue of climate change.
Duration: 2'31

SISTER ALFONSUS: I'm interested in climate change because I believe that we are one people, that we're all brothers and sisters. And in a family, like the one I grew up in, it was a case of sharing, everybody had to have a fair share. My mother was very strict on that. So, I don't see in our present world that people are getting fair shares. And I'm very concerned for the poor, particularly in places like Bangladesh and Kenya, where CAFOD works, but also the poor in my own country. And I also believe if you want to go further than that and be a bit selfish, that if we don't protect the poor, we're not going to survive, even us, we're not going to survive. I don't have children - cause I'm a sister - but I do have grand nephews, grand nieces, and little tiny things, and I want there to be a world for them and I'm not sure there will be.

EB: Why do you think the world has been so slow in responding to climate change? What is it that is preventing people from taking action?

SISTER ALFONSUS: Seems to me it takes poorer people a longer time to speak out because basically father and mother, they have to survive. And if they have AIDS, if they're very, very poor, then they haven't got the time or energy or anything, except to survive. But there comes a point, I think, when people say this is enough.

EB: There's more awareness of climate change, but there seems to be a cognitive dissonance between the awareness and being prepared to actually do anything about it in your own life. Is there anything that you, from your experiences, can offer to help people take on this responsibility, to actually see that their individual contribution can help?

SISTER ALFONSUS: There has been a campaign called "Live Simply". If you really begin to live simply, you have more of an idea what it is like for people who live very, very simply. I was in West Africa for nearly 2 years. It wasn't very long. It still to me is a wonder when I put on a switch and the light comes on, and you turn on the tap and water comes out, because we didn't have that. The electricity could go and it might come back in an hour, two hours, 3 days, same with the water. But if you begin to simplify your own life, if you begin to try to see that you don't have too many lights on, and you don't overuse the water, and you're not thinking of your own self all the time, then you'll become more aware, I think, of what it is like for other people who don't have the choice to do that.

PRES: Sister Alfonsus, a Dominican nun from the north of London, speaking to Emily Benson of the Stakeholders Forum at the Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen last month.