Tropical islands in the south Pacific and the polar regions are two areas that stand to face the most immediate and dramatic effects of global warming, said David Hik, a biology professor at the University of Alberta.

Island countries are particularly vulnerable to rising sea levels, while melting ice poses its own set of challenges to the Arctic, said Hik, director of the Canadian chapter for the International Polar Year, a two-year project allowing researchers from 63 countries to collaborate and gain insight into the Arctic and Antarctic.

“(Global warming) is not isolated by geography, the whole world is connected through the hydrological system,” said Hik. “Changes in the polar region of the Arctic have effects in other parts of the world.”

{sidebar id=1}A consequence of global warming is that Arctic sea ice cover is shrinking at the rate of 8.6 per cent per decade. If this rate continues the Arctic Ocean will be ice-free in summer by 2060 according to the United Nations Environment Program.

When sea ice in Hudson Bay melts two weeks earlier it forces hungry polar bears to come ashore. Lorraine Brandson, a 24-year veteran with the Churchill-Hudson Bay diocese, has witnessed polar bears coming into town looking for food.

“We have had an increasing number of bears being handled,” said Brandson, curator for Churchill’s Eskimo Museum, established by the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate in 1944.

“The Department of Conservation has a polar bear alert 675-BEAR with people available 24 hours to scare bears out of the zone around the town. Sometimes they have to put them in a ‘jail’ or further north.”

When the Inuit, who make up 85 per cent of the diocese’s population, see more bears come into their communities they believe the bear population has increased and want their hunting quota raised; meanwhile, scientists think it’s because the bears are nutritionally stressed due to a two week shorter hunting season on the melting sea ice, said Brandson, who also works as the administrative assistant to Churchill-Hudson Bay Bishop Reynald Rouleau.

“There you see a conflict between scientific knowledge and local knowledge. We may be seeing more of this... if people perceive things differently,” said Brandson. “There’s always been a real recognition of our diocese that research and understanding of the Arctic is important.”

The diocese sits on the board for the Churchill Northern Studies Centre, a research centre for Arctic studies co-founded by former Churchill-Hudson Bay Bishop Omer Robidoux, O.M.I. The centre encourages aboriginal people to take courses so there is some understanding between science and local knowledge.

Changing weather patterns not only affects polar bears’ lifestyle, it also affects the local people. For the Inuit, “their hunting culture is dependent on sea ice. What’s being documented in the past is as that sea melts, their ability to travel on the land is more difficult, unpredictable,” said Hik.

While Mackenzie-Fort Smith Bishop Denis Croteau, O.M.I, said he has noticed changes in weather such as shorter cold spells and delayed winters, he doesn’t think climate change affects the local people that much.

“I don’t think (climate change) has been so marked in the church here yet, because most of our native people are not living the old lifestyle of hunting, trapping and fur trading,” said Croteau, who’s spent 43 years living in the north. “They’ve adapted to the modern way of life and they have 9-5 jobs and very few will be on the land — and it’s more of a holiday.... From the church point of view it isn’t an issue.”

Brandson disagrees. “Climate change has to be something that’s considered. It will impact people who’ve already seen a lot of modernization in their life.”

Even if these people can buy supplies from the store hunting is important from a nutritional and cultural point of view, she added.

“Every major event or activity is a community feast that is all based on country food. It’s a binding element. It tells them who they are.”

Another consequence of warmer temperatures is melting permafrost, a permanently frozen layer of soil. It’s “creating havoc for roads, bridges, pipelines and most importantly for the four million residents of the Arctic, 110,000 (of whom live) in Canada,” said Hik.

“Things start to twist and sag and sink,” said Whitehorse Bishop Gary Gordon. “If it starts thawing out we will have problems; the foundation starts to get wonky and the building starts shifting around when the permafrost melts.

“The North likes to blame the South for all of its problems. It’s sort of like if all those people down south would stop making all this pollution things would be better up north,” said Gordon.

“I think the witness of Jesus and the Gospel simplifying our lifestyle is both for northern people and for southern people and the church is able to help people and witness to people that we maybe need to downsize. If we lessen our consumption in the West in order to assist the consumption in the poorer nations it would create balance.

“It really comes down to a deep profound respect for the human person,” said Gordon.

Hik said once the results of the International Polar Year are revealed faith organizations could play an important role in communicating them to the communities in which they serve.

“What I fear is these changes could be so rapid, the upheaval could be very disruptive for these communities, but that requires being prepared, having good information and sufficient time to plan,” Hik said, explaining the better integrated faith communities are into the social, cultural and spiritual life of the local communities, the better they will be able to help.

“A strong community that can make good decisions on how to prepare for change and adapt to change will be able to maintain its culture,” he added.

Brandson said people who contemplate working in northern dioceses need to make a serious time commitment and not just see it as work experience.

“The local people do know the difference between someone who is coming up for a job and leaving and someone who wants to be with them and loves them.

“We have to promote that some new people would want to take a vocation in the north and support the local lay leaders who are quite admirable.”