BETHLEHEM, Pa. — A journalist with roots in the Lehigh Valley is hosting a new PBS series exploring the intersection between climate change and religion.
“Sacred Planet with Gulnaz Khan” is a four-part documentary series focused on how indigenous leaders and traditional religious communities across the world are grappling with the impacts of climate change.
Throughout the series, Khan, who grew up in Upper Macungie Township, travels to South America, Africa and Japan, sharing the stories of those drastically impacted, through the lens of religion, and how they’re protecting what remains.
“It's in the news every day — the hottest year on record, 100-year storms happening every few years,” Khan said. “But somehow, that still hasn't moved the world toward meaningful action, and that’s really troubling.
“And I thought, ‘Well, if the economic and scientific explanations aren't moving the world fast enough, what if we tap into this idea of the sacred, of appealing to what people hold most dear, the things that give people meaning?’”
The first episode premiers 10 p.m. Wednesday, Sept. 10, on PBS.
‘The way humans make meaning’
A journalist with a background in psychology, public health and climate change, Khan said the idea for the series sprung from black-and-white photos from the 1950s, found while she was researching a travel story.
They showed Hindu pilgrims trekking through Kasmir, India, to the Amarnath caves.
There, pilgrims worship at a natural ice formation called the Shiva Lingam, believed to be a manifestation of Lord Shiva, a principal deity in Hinduism.
“I was so fascinated, because I'd never seen anything like it,” Khan said. “So I did some additional research … and I found out that over the past decade or two, because of rising temperatures, this ice formation was increasingly not forming at all.
“So pilgrims would make this really arduous, high altitude trek to find these empty caves where they expected to encounter the divine.”
Then, something clicked, Khan said.
“This wasn't just the deterioration of the environment or cultural norms, it was really the unraveling of the way humans make meaning."Gulnaz Khan
“This wasn't just the deterioration of the environment or cultural norms, it was really the unraveling of the way humans make meaning,” she said.
“I did more digging and started looking into other sacred sites around the world that were being impacted by climate change.”
Then, in 2022, Khan was designated a TED Scripps fellow in environmental journalism at Colorado University Boulder.
“I already had this interest, this project, but there I really had the opportunity to take religion classes, filmmaking classes, philosophy classes and really began to explore how faith communities are responding to ecological breakdown,” she said.
“This idea that beyond scientists, there are actually so many climate experts, we just don't call them that, right? But farmers, spiritual leaders, indigenous elders — they are the keepers of so much of this wisdom.
"But kind of Western environmentalism and even journalism doesn't always acknowledge that or explore it deeply.”
A year and four months after pre-production began, Khan has a four-episode season.
In the first episode, “The Heart of the World,” Khan travels to Colombia’s Sierra Nevada de Santa Marta, the world’s highest coastal mountain range, to share the stories of the Arhuaco people, one of the few indigenous communities in the Americas to preserve their cultural traditions through centuries of colonization.
In the three episodes that follow, Khan goes to the Saraha desert, Japan’s Lake Suwa and Paucartambo, Peru.
Throughout, she meets with scholars, scientists, Muslim and Christian communities, Shinto priests and explores the intersection of Catholic and Andean beliefs.
‘Tell stories in a really human way’
Khan grew up in the Valley, where she attended Parkland High School for her freshman and sophomore years.
After getting a bachelor’s degree in psychology at Temple University, she was a full-time researcher, first in behavioral psychiatry, then neuroscience.
Her career path has “taken some interesting turns along the way,” she said.
After taking six months backpacking in Southeast Asia, she became interested in public health.
While working to get her master’s of science at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, she worked as a graduate assistant for a journalist at Human Rights Watch.
“That's when I really became kind of enamored with the power of journalism,” she said.
“I think we all go into journalism being a little bit idealistic, and what I saw was this incredible work that was connecting science and making it accessible to a broader public and really making a difference that way.
“And I kind of thought, ‘Well, you know, I think there should be more people in journalism with this kind of scientific literacy who can also tell stories in a really human way.’”
Ahead of the premier of the first episode, Khan said she was nervous and excited. She said she plans to have a watch party this week with family at her home in Upper Macungie.
“Part of me is like, ‘How is this going to be received by people? How is it going to be received by the communities we filmed with?’" she said.
“It's a time when I'm really excited, but also nervous, and also just a moment that I really want to share with my family — the people who made me who I am, and were such a vital part in encouraging me to do this, and so supportive when I was out traveling and all the challenges and internal struggles along the way.”
‘In my own home’
While the series takes place in locations across the globe, there’s plenty for audiences across the United States, and in the Lehigh Valley, to take from it, she said.
"I really hope that the series brings attention to these communities and other communities like them. That is my biggest hope, dream for this — the ultimate goal.”Gulnaz Kahn
“I really want people to connect with these communities, even though they might seem different than what they're accustomed to,” Khan said.
“And I really hope that the series brings attention to these communities and other communities like them. That is my biggest hope, dream for this — the ultimate goal.”
She’s said she's also hopeful audiences connect “the local back to the global” — bridging the impacts of climate change around the world to viewers’ hometowns.
“I grew up in the Lehigh Valley," she said. "I've been fortunate enough to have seen so much of the world and talk to communities everywhere who are grappling with climate impacts.
“I recently came back to the Lehigh Valley after so much time away, and I noticed some of these things happening in my own home.
"And that's what I want to invite people to reflect on, because this is a global series airing in North America, and in this season, we don't have a North American episode.”
‘Glaring inconsistencies'
As a person grows, they become fluent in the seasonal shifts in their hometowns, developing a sort of intuition for what's normal and what's expected, she said.
“When things start shifting, when familiar patterns break down, when these rhythms that you've internalized your whole life begin to falter, you feel it before everyone else does — this place that shaped you is changing.
"And because you know it so deeply, so personally, you're among the first to witness this kind of loss, even if it's subtle."
"Honestly, no matter where you live, if you are paying attention to the natural rhythms around you, you're probably noticing changes.”Gulnaz Kahn
At her family home, there’s less snow in the winter, there’s more flooding throughout the year and trees, as well as other plants, aren’t as healthy, she said.
“It's these little things, but, to me, they're glaring inconsistencies,” she said.
“For this series, we were exploring some pretty extreme environments, whether that was glaciers at extreme altitudes or the Sahara, because that's where you really are seeing dramatic and accelerated changes.
“But, honestly, no matter where you live, if you are paying attention to the natural rhythms around you, you're probably noticing changes.”
