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| "Go Green" Year of Jubilee In July 2009, Journey UCC did a worship series on "It's Not Easy Being Green". As an outcome of the series, we've made a commitment to a "Go Green Year of Jubilee" as outlined by Rebecca Barnes-Davies in her book, "50 Ways to Help Save the Earth: How You and Your Church Can Make a Difference". Each week from August 2009 through July 2010 we'll post some ideas that focus on one of Rebecca's "50 ways"  50 Ways to Help Save the Earth: How You and Your Church Can Make a Difference by Rebecca Barnes-Davies (Westminster John Knox Press: Louisville, Kentucky)
All information on this page comes directly from Rebecca's book. You can order your own copy at http://www.cokesbury.com/forms/ProductDetail.aspx?pid=795298 Week 49: Leave No Trace
It is important to get outdoors even if you can't get away from your neighborhood. Spending time outdoors is another way to connect to the wilderness, if on a more subtle scale. Dandelions pushing through concrete can teach the resilience of wild things. Swinging at the local park can be a way for a child to feel the pull of earth's gravity, the delight of wind, and the scale of human feed compared to tall trees nearby. While air pollution and high ozone days mean that there are times when it may be appropriate to say indoors, we all can find some opportunities to get outside and enjoy the world outside our doorstep. 1. Exit your front door, knowing that God's creation is al around us even in urban areas or very domesticated rural areas. 2. Realize that outdoor meals, playground time, neighborhood walks and sports played on the lawn are all part of enjoying the outdoors, exposing our senses to the wider world, and creating empathy with nonhuman life. 3. Take a walk without talking. Instead of human conversation, spend time on noticing beautiful flowers, interesting insects, and fascinating animal behavior or plant life. 4. Pray for the world on your doorstep. Sitting on your front porch, stairs, or balcony, pray to God in thanks for each thing you look upon, asking God's blessing on its life. 5. Make up games, such as versions of tag, that encourage participants to name parts of nature around them. We humans like to leave our mark. Perhaps it is our animal instinct coming out. However, whee many animals mark their territory with smell, we tend to mark what we think is our territory in much more indelible ways. We usually know humans have been there is something drastic has changed the landscape. Huge structures, changes in the natural course of a rive, a forest that has been clear-cut - these are the ways to tell humans have been through a particular part of go'ds creation. Is this the best way for us to be who God created us to be? Leaving no harmful trace of ourselves when we have walked through the woods or otherwise enjoyed the wilderness is one way to begin to walk humbly with God and to be helpful participants in God's creation. 1. Follow wilderness rules of leaving no trace when exploring. Carry out whatever you carried in. 2. Study Scripture references to humility and to our place in covenant with God. Recognize the arrogance embedded in the attitude that it is okay to leave visible marks of our presence. 3. Take responsibility for proper disposal of your own trash, compost, recyclables, and toxins. Understand that our waste, whether we live in cities or rural areas, impacts wild lands. 4. Be cautious and thoughtful of new human inventions, be they time-saving devices or new technologies. Insist that the burden of proof be on the new invention to provde it does not negatively harm creation before it is adopted. Week 47: Treasure the Globe's Wild Places
All around the world are magnificent landscapes, ecosystems, and natural wonders. the Great Barrier Reef, the Grand Canyaon, the Galapagos Islands, Victoria Falls, Mount Everest, the Northern Lights, and many more amazing, complex, and beautiful parts of God's creation can inspire awe and encourage us to protect the earth for future generations. While we may not all be able to travel to these and other "natural wonders of the world,' we can learn about them and be thankful for them. Wild places around the world are treasures whether they're internationally recognized or not. Whether traveling internationally or learning about wild places at home, the more we learn about the wild variety of God's creation, the better we can protect it. 1. Do a library or Internet search for natural wonders of the world. Learn about the wonders named by various authorities (there is no definitve list). Which inspire you? what do they have to teach us? How is God Glorified in them? 2. Explore ways these areas are currently protected and if there are ways that they are threatened by human development and/or climate change. 3. Host a film fest or movie night in your church or home to learn about wild places around the world. Borrow videos from the library or local conservation groups, or rent them from video stores. 4. If you are planning a vacation, consider eco-tourism. Plan a trip to a natural wonder, a national park, or little-known wild place. Bring home stories and pictures to share with your neighbors, family or congregation. Week 46: Purchase Products That Protect Wilderness
It is easy to walk into a store and buy a brand-new wooden bookcase, a ream of office paper, or a pound of coffee without considering what impact that purchase has on wilderness areas (cn, in the end, on climate change). However, there types of purchases are part of our personal pledge to care for the earth. The good news is that it is possible to buy products that protect wilderness no matter income bracket we are in. Secondhand items are actually the best purchases, as they mean no additional resources were used and not extra energy consumed in order to produce the itme that is new to you. However, for those who want a brand-new item (or need it, in the case of food products, for instance), opportunities abound to purchase fairly traded, sustainably harvested high-quality products. 1. When shopping for products made of wood, try to buy secondhand. Know your local consignment stores and yard sale schedules and you will be amazed at the products you can find for reasonable prices. If you can't find what you are looking for secondhand, look for wood that is certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC). 2. For home and office use, buy recycled paper or paper that is certified by the FSC. 3. Drink fair-trade, shade grown coffee. Shade trees, among which coffee plants are grown, offer habitat for birds and add diversity to the soil. Drink fairly traded coffee that is shade-grown and helps to protect wilderness, whereas traditional coffee plantations clean the land of all trees. 4. For your church, purchase "eco-palms" for Palm Sunday. Week 45: Make More Space for Green
Before the Industrial Revolution, the notion that future generaions might need to actively make space for wilderness to have a rightful place alongside human development might have been considered absurd. However, we have now reached a point where such green spaces are shrinking. Reclaiming current land for wilderness absorbs carbon dioxide, provides habitat for wildlife, and inspires people to care about creation. Creating more green spaces in urban areas in particular can create peaceful settings, lessen stress, and help keep city-dwellers connected to the rest of creation. Rural areas naturally have mroe green space, but it is worth investigating if there are some areas needing to be reclaimed. 1. Find old parking lots or pavements that can be turned back into grassy areas or gardens. 2. Beautify current areas that often go unattended or unnoticed. Search on the internet for "guerrilla gardeners" to read about volunteer gardeners who beautify public spaces that have been neglected. 3. Plant a garden on a flat rooftop to absorb carbon emissions, keep the building insulated and add color and life to an otherwise dull area. 4. Encourage your town or city council to create a "green belt" around the city - places that will be preserved from future development. Having a policy ont he books is a necessary protection to keep and make green space. 5. Explore ways to further the current protection of green spaces - be they parks, meadows, forests, or prairies. Check with your local conservation organizations for ideas. 6. Encourage gardeners and farmers to let some land lie fallow and/or to plant cover crops in the winter to enrich and protect the soil and encourage biodiversity. Week 44: Learn About Local Land Use
In order to protect wilderness areas, we need first to know what land is already protected as well as what zoning laws and plans for future develepment leave other areas vulnerable. Most urban dwellers appreciate their city parks but realize that these often lack native plants, true habitat for wildlife, or any hint of real wilderness. People in many rural communities love their landscapes, only to find empty stretches of land quickly turned into commercial areas. While not all development is negative, it is important that everyone in the community be allowed to participate thoughtfully in decisions about what they hope future landscapes will be. Whether in cities or rural areas, throughtful decisions about local land use are crucial to protecting wilderness. 1. Find out from your city or town council what zoning laws exist and what areas are protected as either "green space" or wilderness areas. Ask what areas are slated for commercial development that currently are wilderness. What kinds of limitations on future development do wilderness protections offer? 2. Consider what restrictions you think are fair to put on the land. For instance, you may consider it just and appropriate to include native hunting or fishing rights in the wilderness areas on which indigenout communities have long depended for food. 3. Learn if local conservation groups have projects to reclaim any abandoned or unused industrial or commercial sites. How will they do the recalmation? What will they plant? 4. Host an old-fashioned storytelling night in your neighborhood or congregation to exchange memories and stories about your bioregion, sharing your favorite wild places (past or present). Week 43: Plant Trees
 This is not a suggestion that everyone should go plant a tree in the backyard. Depending on where you live and why you're planting the tree, you may not have the impact on climate change that you desire. In any place, protecting current forests and old-growth trees is beneficial. In addition, individually planted trees on your property can shade windows (reducing energy use inside), provide habitat for wildlife, and add beauty to the property. While planting new trees taht are native to, and sustainable in, a particular region will help with soil erosion, desertificiation, and local wood needs, not all tree planting necessarily will hlep cool the planet. Trees absorb carbon dioxide and produce oxygen, an dthey evaporate water and keep things cool (just think of walking into a forest on a sunny day). However, in temperate zones the effects of adding more dark canopy may absob (rather than reflect) the sun's rays and could actually lead to a kind of warming affect. (In tropical zones, however, planting tress should help to slow climate change). How To's 1. Support organizations working to stop deforestation. Protecting current forests, particularly rina forests, is crucial. 2. If you want to plant a new tree in your garden, on your lawn, or on your church grounds, check with your county extension or a local arborist for advice as to when and how to plant in your region and what treees are recommended for your purpose. 3. Research movements to plant trees and find out where they are planting (temperate or tropical), what kinds of trees they are using and why they are planting. For instance, if trees are lanted to bolster the livelihood of people living in poverty, or to bring back past biodiversity, it may be worth supporting even is such planting might be in a temperate zone and thus not necessarily hlep climate change.
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