Press Release: A follow up climate justice action to Pope Francis’ visit to Washington, D.C.

A follow up climate justice action to Pope Francis’s visit to Washington, D.C.

Visuals: 50-foot United States of Fracking banner and No New Permits quilt

Audio: Short statements from fasters and clergy; singing; chanting

Facebook event:  https://www.facebook.com/events/397353760461766/

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On Friday, Sept. 25, fasters from Beyond Extreme Energy (BXE), together with their supporters and leaders from several faiths, will break bread in front of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) in D.C to end a dramatic eighteen-day fast undertaken to demand that FERC stop issuing permits for the pipelines, storage facilities and LNG export terminals that use fracked natural gas, and instead heed Pope Francis’s call to care for the Earth.

On Friday copies of the Pope’s encyclical will be presented to the five FERC commissioners; and there will be music, brief statements, and a procession, featuring BXE’s colorful and moving 50-foot anti-fracking banner, “The United Sates of Fracking”, around the FERC headquarters block, to honor the Planet and the People. BXE will also display the new quilt made in collaboration between fasters and residents of far-flung communities fighting fracking infrastructure in their communities.

Steve Norris, of North Carolina, at 72 is one of the oldest fasters. Describing what he has learned during the fast, he said:

“Being here, eating no food for 18 days, has taken me at 72 the oldest faster a fascinating and disorienting rabbit hole, where ‘normal’ appears absurd and even suicidal, and where unrealistic may be our only way out. I think because of our legal structures, because of their narrow fossil fuel focus, and because people disbelieve in viable alternatives, their minds are wedded to the madness of more fossil fuels.”

Sean Glenn, of Connecticut, at 23 is one of the youngest fasters. “I think this fast has just reinforced my belief in the power of people and our ability to overcome our old ways and really embrace new ones with complete curiosity, not knowing what we’re getting into,” she says. “The love that everyone has shown has been really powerful and the respect that we’re receiving for it is what has surprised me.”

WHERE: Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC), 888 1st St NE, Washington, DC.

WHEN: Friday, Sept. 25, noon to 1:30 p.m.

WHO: The fasters, their supporters, and faith leaders.

WHY: The BXE fasters demand that FERC end its fracking-friendly support for expanding natural gas infrastructure, which has led to a toxic locked-in fossil fuel network at the expense of safe, sound, and clean renewable energy. Fracking wells and gas pipelines contaminate the homes and communities nearby, and also leak methane, which is responsible for about 25% of the man-made global warming we experience today.

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Beyond Extreme Energy is a network of people and organizations dedicated to raising public awareness of the disastrous effects of fracking, natural gas infrastructure, and other kinds of extreme energy extraction; to taking direct action to stop them, and to promoting policies based on clean and safe renewable energy.