Ten Plagues of Fossil Fuels

The latest report from the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), released less than two weeks ago, tells us what many of us already knew: that we have even less time than we thought—3 years—to transform our energy systems. Leaving fossil fuels in the ground and unburned is essential to avert the worst impacts of the climate crisis. The report also had some good news: we already have the technology we need to make this transition.

Dayenu! We have had enough. Enough destruction and delay.

And, dayenu! We have enough: We have the technology, and will to change, and we can do it. 

A few things stand in our way: politicians in the pocket of Big Oil, Gas, and Coal, for one, and a seemingly endless supply of money flowing to fossil fuels, for another.

This spring, we’re taking on both, starting with the big banks and asset managers that fund fossil fuels. During Passover, grounded in our collective memory of liberation from Egypt, and the possibility of a better world for all, we will gather outside of these financial institutions in our communities, and call on them to move their dough.

Join us at 4pm on Wednesday, April 20 in Larchmont Village outside of branches of a Chase Bank, Bank of America, and Wells Fargo to tell the fossil fuel financiers: Let our planet go!

Now, putting a drop of wine on our plates for each plague, let us recite the Ten Plagues of fossil fuels:

1. Wildfires
2. Sea-level rise
3. Species extinction
4. Drought
5. Weather chaos
6. Pollution
7. Forced migration
8. War
9. Famine
10. Pandemics

How are these plagues affecting your life?

Who can come to the action on Wednesday?

What else can we do to alleviate the fossil fuel plagues for everyone?


haggadah Section: -- Ten Plagues
Source: Adapted from Dayenu