CREATION CARE MINISTRY
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The Episcopal Church’s Covenant for the Care of Creation is a commitment to practice loving formation, liberating advocacy, and life-giving conservation as individuals, congregations, ministries and dioceses. It is helpful to review this as our Creation Care Ministry moves forward using this covenant as our guide: In Jesus, God so loved the whole world. We follow Jesus, so we love the world God loves. Concerned about the global climate emergency, drawing from a range of approaches for our diverse contexts, we commit to form and restore loving, liberating, life-giving relationships with all of Creation. LOVING FORMATION For God’s sake, we will grow our love for the Earth and all of life through preaching, teaching, storytelling, and prayer. LIBERATING ADVOCACY For God’s sake, standing alongside marginalized, vulnerable peoples, we will advocate and act to repair Creation and seek the liberation and flourishing of all people. LIFE-GIVING CONSERVATION For God’s sake, we will adopt practical ways of reducing our climate impact and living more humbly and gently on Earth as individuals, households, congregations, institutions, and dioceses. To learn more about Immanuel’s Creation Care Ministry and Action Team, contact Denise Freeland at eco.voce@verizon.net. |
RESOURCES
Click here for information on how to reduce, reuse, and recycle 
CREATION CARE NEWS
In time for Easter — Our Trex Bench has arrived and was assembled and placed in the Memorial Garden last week by Shawn Whitman. 
It is a powerful reminder that our parishioners and friends kept 500 pounds of plastic bags out of our local streams, rivers, and bellies of wildlife by donating the plastic bags and films to Immanuel’s Recycling Challenge. Our bench is the product responsibly created for us by Trex from our 500 pounds of plastic collected. And all of this was happening during the pandemic.
We invite you to go sit on the new bench and take some time to reflect on the past year. Thank you to all who participated in the Recycling Challenge and for caring for God’s Creation in this way. --Submitted by Denise Freeland February 15, 2021 Solar Update The Immanuel Facilities Group and Creation Care Action Team continue to explore solar power at Immanuel Church-on-the-Hill and how best to fund a solar installation. One possibility is a partnership with Virginia Theological Seminary (VTS). Thanks to some conversations between our Father Randy and Dean Markham last fall, a small group from Immanuel, representatives from IPSun Solar and a representative of VTS met virtually in early December to resume the solar conversations and discuss possible ways to fund solar installations both on the Zabriskie Chapel/Parish Hall building as well as potentially on some VTS buildings. Stay tuned for further developments! Sacred Space - The Memorial Garden The team continues to think about how to integrate sustainable practices into our planning and care for the grounds at our church. This spring, we will work with Chain Bridge Native Landscapes, a local company focused on integrating native plants and sustainable design, on several areas on our property that need new planting. As we go through this process, we are also considering the other areas on our property, most especially the Memorial Garden, and we hope to contract with this company for further discussion and planning over the summer and fall. We have been blessed to have strong parishioner support over many years to care for the gardens and other spaces on the property, and we look forward to engaging many in the parish in projects on the grounds through 2021 and beyond. |