End of the Age of Thorns, Surviving Consumerism
CEL’s Annual one day conference was held at St John’s Church, Waterloo, London on Saturday 5th March 2011. Our guest speakers were Peter Owen Jones, Sussex vicar, presenter of BBC’s ‘How to live a simple life’ and Tim Cooper, Professor of Sustainable Design and Consumption at Nottingham Trent University. A fuller description of our main speakers is given as a Press Release. Or alternatively here is what they had to say:
The text of the talk given by Peter Owen Jones : Has anyone seen a butterfly yet
The power points for the talks given by Tim Cooper: A Christian Perspective and Christians as Consumers
In the afternoon: Greening the church workshop, led by Ruth Jarman.
Ruth Jarman, picture by Martin Davis
See also the resource Creation Care Policy of St John’s Hartley Wintney
1. ecocell1 – a toolkit to help you to live a more simple, more Christian lifestyle. Each module is complete in itself and can be studied in any order. Each module contains a section on biblical and theological reflection, which makes it ideal for use with house groups and study groups.
Modules include: Introductory Session; Waste; Shopping & Food; Energy in the Home; Water; Travel & Transport.
2. Eco-congregation – for your church to sign up to doing something. Eco- congregation will walk you through the whole programme with a fabulous new web site, new material, sensitive to where your church is now, with the theology and activities to help you green your church step by step.
Modues inclue: Church Check-up ; Greening worship; Theology and Environment; Children and Creation Care; Young People and Environmental issues ; Resources for small groups; Greening the church building; see their website for more.
3. Notes from discussion section
Question 1: What problems have you encountered greening your church?
Culture of not practicing what we preach; “not another group!” – everyone’s too busy.; Cynicism; Engrained attitudes; Maintaining commitment and enthusiasm; Church building design; Capital to fund projects; Clergy leadership; People overwhelmed by scale of problem; Christian identity is not green; Sceptical of environmental issues; Land not available; Environmental issues seen as too political/radical; Regulations;
Question 2: How have you/can we overcome these obstacles?
Shrinking the footprint; Lobby opinion-formers; Clergy training; Agree an environmental policy; Use LOAF principles; Events; Environmental prayer; Reconfigure Christmas (see Reclaim Christmas at www.operationnoah.org ); Small steps; Guerrilla gardening; Love and dialogue; Work with and support youth;
Thanks to Martin Davis and Judith Allison for their photographs
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