==Religious beliefs about water==
'''In the Abrahamic traditions (Judaism, Christianity and Islam) ''' water is both life-giving and life-taking. It is both an instrument of divine power (in some traditions the Noah Flood was sent as punishment of sinful humanity) and it is a symbol of rebellion. In the Book of Psalms, water is depicted as an unruly force associated with chaos and needing to have its boundaries set. It is also seen as a symbol of life giving gifts from God. For example, when Moses strikes the rock as the Israelites leave Egypt in flight from slavery and water gushes forth to stop them dying of thirst in the desert.
'''In Chinese mythology''', the greatest hero of antiquity, Yu the Great, earns his title because for ten years without ceasing he fights the Yellow River, which had broken its banks and was destroying the land and people of China. Yet water is also the context within which the powerful and protector dragon deities live. And it is over the seas and oceans that the goddess of Compassion, Guan Yin, floats – the greatest of all Chinese deities.
'''In Hinduism''', the world is born from an ocean upon which floats the supreme deity Vishnu and the end of the world will once again bring back this primal ocean which will give birth in time to all life again.
Water also features in many sacred rituals from baptism to offerings to the deities. Water is sacred because the faiths know, and have known for millennia that without water there is no life.
Hygiene , too , is sacred. The earliest examples of enforced hygiene are probably the codes written down in the 2nd millennium BC for washing your hands after touching anything that is polluting. These laws, to be found in the Laws of Mani or in the laws of the Old Testament, were designed to make unforgettable and unavoidable, the ritual of hand washing as both a sacred responsibility and a necessary health protection measure. In Islam this is manifest in the ritual washing before the five prayer times each day – wudu as it is known – and therefore in the need to provide running water and proper drainage in the mosques. In Japan, when you enter a Shinto shrine, you wash your hands and mouth and so running water and proper drainage are a central part of the shrine complex.
==Secular organisations working with faith groups==
