November 5, Windsor. The ARC-UNDP Celebration ended yesterday evening with a moving public meeting at the Quakers' Friends Meeting House, Euston, a place where Gandhi once spoke, and where tonight voices from all over the religious world gave witness to their work on the environment. "We've had some incredible days at Windsor," said UN Assistant Secretary General Olav Kjorven, in his keynote speech. "Most of us [working on development or environment issues] have stories about how nature has affected us deeply and inspired us to walk down a certain path. And this is fundamentally a driving force we cannot afford not to talk about. In my business in international development bureaucracies, we have much to learn... We can talk in all these acronyms, MRV, CDM, MDGs... but what we are really trying to do is trying, as humanity, to make peace with the planet." More about this later.

From November 2-4, 2009, faith leaders from around the world met at Windsor at an event hosted by HRH The Prince Philip and attended by the Secretary General of the United Nations, His Excellency Mr Ban Ki-moon. The aim was to launch and discuss their long term initiatives to Protect the Living Planet. The Celebration came just over a month before the Copenhagen Climate Change talks in December

The Celebration - a Summit of Religious and Secular leaders - launched more than 30 long-term commitments (links fromr our Commitments page) by many major faith traditions from within 9 faiths. These Commitments cover for example: all Daoist Temples in China solar powered; creating faith-based eco-labelling systems in Islam, Hinduism and Judaism; greening all types of religious buildings; protecting sacred forests; developing ethical investment policies; printing sacred books on environmentally-friendly paper; creating educational programmes through the faiths' major role in both formal and informal education.

Just over a year ago, ARC and UNDP launched the unique partnership to help faiths make these long-term plans and commitments. The commitments are related to the fundamental problem of our abuse of nature - of which climate change is one major symptom. While the proximity of the Copenhagen COP is important, these faith commitments will take place whatever does or does not happen at Copenhagen.

 Windsor marked the largest ever commitment by the faiths to environmental action. To partner with them ARC and UNDP invited key secular environmental organisations to commit to work side by side with the faiths. From this initiative and this meeting new collaborations are already being planned, including links between Shintos, Church of Norway, Maronites and others on forestry standards.

"The world's faiths joined together in this cause - if viewed in terms of sheer numbers of people - could become the planet's largest civil society movement for change. With their unparalleled presence throughout the world, the world's religions could be the decisive force that helps top the scales in favor of a world of climate safety and justice for future generations... this event will be one for the history books," said Olav Kjorven, Assistant Secretary-General UNDP.

Members of the public were invited to a major public forum on November 4 at Friends Meeting House in London entitled: "Many Heavens: One Earth - Faiths, the Environment and Copenhagen". It included panel discussions with leading practitioners and intergovernmental organisations, including Sally Bingham, founder of Interfaith Power and Light, Nigel Savage, founder of the environmental Jewish charity Hazon, and Olav Kjorven, Assistant Secretary-General of the UN. There were also three moving performances of Conference of the Birds, a creation moment from the Rigveda, and St Frances' Canticle of the Creatures, taking from the different faith traditions a moment where nature is given a voice.