Four Christians convicted over climate protest at Bath Abbey

A retired Church of England vicar and three Christian climate activists have been convicted of aggravated trespass after dropping a huge banner saying ‘Don’t Crucify Creation’ from the tower of Bath Abbey.

The banner in place on Bath Abbey | Photo © Jamie Bellinger

The two-day trial was heard by a district judge at Bristol Magistrates’ Court.

The defendants have accused church officials of prioritising tourism over planetary breakdown and billions of deaths.

Their protest had been part of a national day of action by Christian Climate Action (CCA) on 13th September last year, calling on the Church of England to speak out more clearly and persistently about the Climate and Nature Emergency and existential threat to life on Earth.

During CCA’s day of action, similar protests took place at Canterbury, York, Winchester, Westminster Abbey, Durham and Southwark cathedrals with no arrests.

The four in the dock in Bristol last week were the Reverend Bill White, 71, from Macclesfield in Cheshire; 66-year-old Stephen Pritchard, a former parish councillor from Radstock; Emma Ireland, a 41-year-old mental health worker from Bristol; and Kate Chesterman, 60, a retired university worker from Hythe in Kent.

They argued that they acted out of necessity as experts predict two billion deaths due to climate change by 2050.

The four had occupied the tower for the launch of CCA’s Stop Crucifying Creation vision booklet, hanging a huge banner from the top, sitting down and asking to speak to the Bishop of Bath and Wells, the Right Reverend Michael Beasley, to seek his support for the campaign.

Bath Abbey officials called police, who threatened to carry the activists down a narrow spiral staircase to evict them. The four said they walked down the steps to prevent either the police, or themselves, from being hurt. They were arrested and charged with aggravated trespass and obstruction. Public tours of the tower were disrupted for the rest of the day.

The four activists during the protest on the roof of Bath Abbey | Photo provided

At their trial on Thursday 16th and Friday 17th July, many supporters were outside Bristol Magistrates’ Court and in the public gallery.

District Judge Nicholas Wattam did not accept the defence of necessity and fined each of the defendants £200 and to pay £700 in court costs and victim surcharge.

After the verdict, three CCA members – James Grote, Deborah Wilde and Sue Hampton – stood and unfurled a ‘Don’t Crucify Creation’ banner in the public gallery.  They were not detained but allowed to leave court with their banner.

CCA says a report by the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries and climate scientists from the University of Exeter – ‘Planetary Solvency: Finding Our Balance with Nature’ – predicts more than two billion people will die as a result of global trajectories of 2°C of global warming by 2050.

The defendants said the response from church leaders in calling the police showed they cared more about making money from tower tours than the impending deaths of billions due to climate breakdown.

Kate Chesterman told the court: “If the best the church can do is prioritise tourism over its own followers attempting to bring the seriousness of the situation to their attention, then there’s something wrong with their religion.”

Stephen Pritchard said: “‘If Jesus were alive today, he would turn over the tables in the gift shop at Bath Abbey and be charged with aggravated trespass.”

Outside court, the Reverend Bill White said: “Early in 2025, a reliable source concluded that between one billion and four billion people will die as a direct result of climate change – the actual numbers depending on what we do and how quickly we do it.

“The Church of England has a five-fold mission to tell, teach, tend, transform and treasure. How can we claim to tend to the needs of the disadvantaged if we’re silent about the Climate Emergency?

“How can we claim to transform unjust structures if we don’t use our position to speak the truth about the multi-national fossil fuel companies, and about their supporting financial institutions?”