Australia's Overshoot Day in 2025 is 19 March
Reflections
“One of the gifts that we can offer as the human family struggles to get itself out of the bind that has been created over centuries of living in a particular way, is to help the people of the west to recapture a sense of their place within the earth system. St Francis and St Clare of Assisi, for example, invite us to see the other creatures of the earth as kin, sisters and brothers, as part of a common family. They invite us to explore a form of relational spirituality that might just change our hearts, and then our minds,” says The Very Rev’d Dr Peter Catt
The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil.
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.
And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs —
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.
Gerard Manley Hopkins, “God’s Grandeur“
We are in need of breaking the habit of a lifetime, many lifetimes in fact.
Helping to break the habit is core Christian business.
For centuries now, and in an accelerated way since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, we have been relying on finding “new” resources to fuel the way we have chosen to live. The era of colonial expansion saw the industrialised countries of the West taking over resources in other parts of the world.
The increased pool of resources made available by colonialism and the earth’s natural capacity to regenerate worked together to keep the earth system operating at a more or less sustainable level for many, many years.
In 1972, however, we reached a critical tipping point.
1972 was the last year in which the human usage of the earth’s resources was sustainable. Ever since we have been consuming the resources of the earth at a rate faster than the earth can regenerate them. Resources such as agricultural land are being depleted and there are no new continents to be “discovered” to expand the resource base.
Each year the Global Footprint Network calculates the number of days of that year that Earth’s biocapacity suffices to provide for humanity’s Ecological Footprint. Overshoot Day is the day in the year when we use a full year’s worth of regenerative capacity. As I said above, in all the years since 1972 we have used up a full year’s worth of regeneration before December 31. The days following the day of parity are known as the days of overshoot; we overshoot the earth’s capacity to sustain life on earth. The days when, contrary to the situation in Gerard Manley Hopkins’ day, nature is in danger of being spent.
In 2025 the day on which we reach Earth Overshoot will be July 24.
The Global Footprint Network not only calculates the Overshoot day for the planet as whole but also calculates the date on which Overshoot would be achieved if everyone on the planet consumed the world’s resources at the same rate as the citizens of particular countries. This allows comparison between countries and serves to remind us that there are many on the earth who live in a more sustainable, less resource-intense way than others.
This week on Wednesday, March 19, we will reach Australia’s Earth Overshoot Day, that is, the day when a whole year’s worth of resources would be consumed if everyone on the planet lived in the same resource-consuming way that we do. By way of comparison, if everyone lived as the Indonesians do we would not reach Overshoot day until November 18.
Comparing year-on-year World Overshoot Day we can monitor whether the human family is coming to terms with the fact that we are degrading the planet. In 2024 World Overshoot Day was August 1 and Australia’s Overshoot Day was April 5. So things have not improved since last year.
In order to focus its life and ministry the Anglican Church seeks to honour what are known as the Marks of Mission. The Fifth Mark of Mission of the Anglican Communion is:
To strive to safeguard the integrity of creation, and sustain and renew the life of the earth
We see this as part of our mission because we understand the planet to be a gift and as Gerard Manley Hopkins expresses it, “The world is charged with the grandeur of God.”
We also understand that the human family has a particular role to play in relation to the earth. We are called to be stewards. This idea is reflected in the Fifth Mark of Mission when it says that part of our mission is To strive to safeguard the integrity of creation…
When the integrity of the earth is safeguarded the planetary systems are sustainable.
One of the gifts that we can offer as the human family struggles to get itself out of the bind that has been created over centuries of living in a particular way, is to help the people of the West to recapture a sense of their place within the earth system. St Francis and St Clare of Assisi, for example, invite us to see the other creatures of the earth as kin, sisters and brothers, as part of a common family. They invite us to explore a form of relational spirituality that might just change our hearts, and then our minds.
On Wednesday at Noon we will hold a short liturgy to mark Australia’s Overshoot Day.
First published in the Cathedral Precinct eNews on 17 March 2025.
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