About | LWCCN

The Lausanne/WEA Creation Care Network exists to empower Christian individuals and churches all over the globe to take action on creation care.

Our History

In October 2010, over 4,000 Christian leaders from 198 countries gathered in Cape Town, South Africa, to discuss critical issues of the time as they related to the church and evangelization. This was the Third Lausanne Congress, convening nearly 35 years after the original Lausanne Congress in 1974, called by Billy Graham. Written as a roadmap for the Lausanne Movement, The Cape Town Commitment presents a statement of shared Biblical convictions, and calls Christians all over the world to action.

Lausanne Movement world leaders included a strong statement on creation care. It reads:

“We are also commanded to care for the earth and all its creatures, because the earth belongs to God, not to us. We do this for the sake of the Lord Jesus Christ who is the creator, owner, sustainer, redeemer and heir of all creation…If Jesus is Lord of all the earth, we cannot separate our relationship to Christ from how we act in relation to the earth. For to proclaim the gospel that says ‘Jesus is Lord’ is to proclaim the gospel that includes the earth, since Christ’s Lordship is over all creation. Creation care is a thus a gospel issue within the Lordship of Christ. The Cape Town Commitment II-B-6, I-7

In 2012, Ed Brown was appointed the Lausanne Senior Associate (now Catalyst) for Creation Care, and in November of 2012, 53 delegates from 25 countries convened in Jamaica to decide how to bring this vision of Creation Care and the Gospel to the global church. Together, the delegates wrote the Jamaica Call to Action, which outlines 10 specific steps that must be taken, along with an urgent call to prayer. The Lausanne Movement, in partnership with several Christian creation care organizations including Care of Creation, A Rocha International and World Evangelical Alliance, then set out to bring the Jamaica Call to Action to life. A document is useless if it doesn’t spur action! (Here are some suggestions for how you can participate in the Jamaica Call to Action.)

With hundreds of people and institutions all over the world symbolically signing the Call to Action, it made sense to start a series of regional conferences to mobilize and encourage creation care in every area of the globe. Thus the Global Campaign for Creation Care and the Gospel was launched.

The ultimate goal of the Global Campaign was “to kickstart and reinvigorate national creation care movements in 30 countries in five years.

In March 2014 we began the Global Campaign in Southeast Asia, meeting in Clark, Pampanga, Philippines. Over 90 people from nine countries participated in discussions, issue-specific breakout sessions, and national planning meetings. At the conclusion, everyone signed the Jamaica Call to Action. The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) came on as co-partner of the movement, and we renamed the group the Lausanne/WEA Creation Care Network. Similar gatherings have taken place across the globe: East and Central Africa (2015), Latin America and Caribbean (2015), Canada/US (2015), West Africa (2015), East Asia (2017), Europe (2017), South Asia (2017), Oceania (2018), and Southern Africa (2018), with more to come in 2020.

Today

The LWCCN leadership team has expanded. Dave Bookless of A Rocha International is a Lausanne Catalyst along with Ed Brown, and we're working to develop Regional Coordinators in various parts of the world. Network members show up at various international environmental conferences like the UN COP climate conferences and are involved in a variety of activities in their own countries. Plans are in the works for a 10th anniversary celebration of the Jamaica Call to Action in November 2022, exact date and venue to be announced. Stay tuned!

Everyone who signs the Jamaica Call to Action, attends a Creation Care and the Gospel Conference, or signs up for our newsletter is considered part of the Lausanne/WEA Creation Care Network. We collaborate and stay connected through a newsletter, over social media, and through regional conferences.

One important task of the network is to gather information on creation care initiatives and projects happening around the world. An online database of projects that we know about can be viewed here. You can upload information about your own project here.

Our People

Ed Brown is the Director and CEO of Care of Creation, and Lausanne Catalyst for Creation Care. Ed has worked closely with Dave in developing the global creation care network under the Lausanne Movement in partnership with the World Evangelical Alliance. He has been involved in creation care for almost 20 years, and before that worked with InterVarsity USA (IFES) and as a pastor. Ed has written two books – Our Father’s World and When Heaven and Nature Sing, and contributed to the Lausanne Library book Creation Care and the Gospel: Reconsidering the Mission of the Church. Ed was recently honored by ACTS Academy of Higher Education in Bangalore, India, with the Honorary Doctor of Divinity degree for his work with the Lausanne creation care network. At home he lives with Susanna, his wife, and has four adult children, two grandchildren, and a dog and a cat.

Dave Bookless is Director of Theology for A Rocha International. He is also an ordained Anglican, serving as vicar of St. Mary’s Norwood Green, in Southall, London. In addition, Dave is a Global Catalyst for Creation Care with the Lausanne Movement, and has recently completed a PhD in Theology and Biodiversity Conservation at Cambridge University. Dave was born in Calcutta India to missionary parents and spent his childhood mainly in Bangalore before the family relocated to the UK. His first degree was Modern History (specializing in post-imperial India) and he then worked as a schoolteacher before training for ordination. Dave has lived with his wife Anne in multiracial and interfaith Southall for the past 28 years, bringing up their 4 now grown-up daughters in vibrant multicultural church settings. His passion is communicating biblical teaching to contemporary cultures, and he speaks all over the world to colleges, churches and conferences. He has contributed to over 20 books and written two, Planetwise (a basic biblical overview on creation care, now translated into Chinese, Dutch French, German and Spanish) and God Doesn’t do Waste (which is an autobiographical account of his family’s journey in creation care). To relax, he enjoys birdwatching and bird banding, running, mountain walking and Asian food.