With grief, we bring news of the passing of a respected friend, Professor Allison Mary Howell. We hear from Rev. Dr. Ebenezer Yaw Blasu, the Director of Allison Howell Centre for Religion, Environment, Science and Development (edited for brevity):

Remembering Prof. Allison Mary Howell: Missionary, Great Scholar of Holistic Mission and Activist of Creation Care in African Perspective.

“Precious in the sight of God is the death of his saints…” (Ps. 116:15).

The late Prof Howell was a missionary committed to Christian development of people in Africa, especially in the areas of spiritual, socio-cultural and environmental concerns at both academic and grassroot levels. She had been instrumental in creation care activism in Ghana and beyond for several years.

Prof Howell was instrumental in introducing courses such as ‘Holistic Mission and Development’ and ‘Theology, Human Needs and Environment’ at postgraduate level at Akrofi-Christaller Institute of Theology, Mission and Culture, (ACI) at Akropng-Akuapem. She was both Dean of Accredited Studies at the time and a great activist of creation care in African perspective—demonstrating this through not only training many research students at ACI, but in the development of a community park known as The Allison Greens.

Prof Howell encouraged and facilitated the networking of scholars, institutions and organizations within the field of creation care. Part of the fruit of this is a now formal partnership between A Rocha Ghana and ACI—promoting creation care at both academic and grassroot levels in Ghana and beyond.

Prof Howell, the Lord gave you to us for a while, and He has taken you away to be with Him eternally. May His name be praised (Job. 1:21). My academic mother and mentor, hede nyuie; Mawu nanᴐ kple wo miaga kpe (fare thee well; God be with you till we meet again).

We lost a hero this week. Sir John Houghton, 88 years old, passed away in a Care facility near his home in Wales UK on 15 April. Known to the world as the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)’s scientific assessment group and lead editor of the first three highly influential IPCC reports, he was a strong evangelical Christian, a passionate advocate for bringing faith and science into the same room, and he was a brother and friend to many of us who are working to bring his work to the attention of the church community.

We will have more say about Sir John in our June Pollinator, but for the time being, here is a list of some of the main tributes to his life and character:

John T. Houghton Wikipedia

Obituaries

John Ray Initiative (Sir John was one of the founders)

Hannah Malcolm, Sir John’s granddaughter, wrote a moving tribute on Twitter. An easy to read version for non-Twitter users is HERE

Church Times

Francisco Martín León writes in tiempo.com: Muere Sir John Houghton, climatólogo y editor fundador del IPCC (in Spanish)

The Weather Channel

Rev Dr Jim Ball: Sir John- a View from the States

Powys County Times

BBC News (17:51 16 Apr)– mostly quotes Hannah Malcolm’s tweets (see above)

Jesus College, Oxford