World churches are making a strong appeal for a much more principle-based approach to the planet's ecological challenges at the United Nations Climate Change Conference meeting in Poznan, Poland.

The biblical story of creation, echoed in the prologue to John's Gospel, famously contains the divine injunction, "Let there be light." But the Church of England says that in an age of eco-cre, a little less light might be needed.

What can churches and religious bodies do that ecological groups are not doing? Can they engage on the issue without merely replicating what is happening in secular society? These are questions global Lutherans have been asking.