Friday 27 November 2015

Bringing Advent Down to Earth


Wise men and women bearing gifts appear in a unique online calendar to bring Advent down to earth. They are clergy and conservationists – presenting specially written podcasts to promote prayer for the planet.


AUDIO CLIPS
Their ‘thought for the day’-style audio clips can be found on A Rocha UK’s Hope for the world website. The aim of the calendar is to equip and inform listeners about the United Nations climate change talks in Paris.


From 1st December, each day brings a different message by such people as – Alpha pioneer Nicky Gumbel, TV presenter Peter Owen-Jones, Christian Aid chief Loretta Minghella, botanist explorer Sir Ghillean Prance and CAFOD director Chris Bain.

‘We have an amazing line-up of contributors. I’m excited about how this calendar can play a unique role in encouraging Christians to pray, reflect and act during the UN talks and the Advent season,’ said Churches And Theology Director Dr Valerio (pictured).


 CLIMATE MARCH

Dr Valerio was speaking at the climate march in London on 29th November. This will be part of a worldwide programme of protest walks in major cities on the eve of the climate change talks, which run from 30th November to 12th December.

And please pray for safety for all those participating in the Climate marches.  And for all those attending the Paris Summit.

The podcasts can be heard at http://advent.arocha.org.uk . Enquirers don’t have to wait until December – they can register now for daily notifications.
- See more at: http://arocha.org.uk/bringing-advent-down-to-earth/#sthash.RxX9RGop.kLdib5cD.dpuf 

(Photo of Dr Ruth Valerio by Clive Price)

Tuesday 17 November 2015

Bags Of Theology

We had our chance. They told us our use of plastic bags was getting out of control. They tried to warn us, but would we listen? Some employed the ‘carrot’ approach, enticing us to reuse our bags by offering us ‘green points’ in their loyalty schemes, but we would not be moved. So now it’s time for the stick.


 From the beginning of October, shops in England with more than 250 employees have had to start charging a minimum of 5p for each plastic carrier bag they give out. As often seems to be the case, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland are way ahead of England, having introduced similar laws over the past few years.

 We were all given the option of behaving responsibly, but too few of us took it; the waste piles continued to grow, and we had to be forced to comply by law rather than by choice.

 For some, the reasons were philosophical – they didn’t believe that the issue was serious enough to warrant action. For others, they were more practical – a simple inability to remember to take bags every time they went out on the off-chance they might need to buy groceries later.

Some, I’m sure, were just too lazy or selfish to make it their problem. That’s the category I’d fall into – if the shop I was patronising didn’t award points for my reused bags, I wouldn’t bother to take any with me. I knew it was a good thing to do. It was easy. It represented a negligible inconvenience to my life, yet I didn’t do it anyway.

 It’s the tiniest of examples, but there’s a well-known principle about those who are – or are not – faithful in the small things. If ‘I do not do the good I want to do’ (Romans 7:19) in this relatively trivial area, that’s probably a reflection on my likelihood – or not – of doing the bigger good things I want to do. ‘What a wretched [person] I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death?’ (Romans 7:24).

 Maybe you think I’m making too much of a simple carrier bag, but it has served to remind me this week of the reality of my sinful nature and my need for a saviour.

 ‘Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!’ (Romans 7:25).

Jennie Pollock is a writer and editor. She blogs at jenniepollock.com and tweets as @missjenniep

 

Taken from LICC (London Institute of Contemporary Theology) Connecting with Culture

Friday 23 October 2015

Caring for birds in your garden

Autumn is the time of year to prepare for winter. For those of us with gardens, we’re cutting back and dividing plants in the beds as well as raking the leaves as they fall off the trees. But it is time to care for the birds, too.

  Nest Boxes:

 If you have bird nest boxes in your garden, the time to clean them is now, between September and December. The birds have finished raising their young, so the boxes will not have any birds living in them. For each box, open the lid, remove the contents and dispose, then pour boiling water in the box concentrating on the corners and bottom. When birds nest, they will have mites, ticks, and lice living in the box and feeding on both adults and chicks. These parasites can survive all winter and resume their activities in the spring, so it’s best to get rid of them now. Do not use any kind of powders as they can harm birds. Leave the box to dry, add some fresh dry grass or leaves, close the box and rehang. Sometimes a nest box might have unhatched eggs and dead chicks; this is not unusual as adult birds might lay more eggs than they can raise or adults cannot find enough food to feed the chicks.

  Food: 

Some birds live here all year, and some migrate through on their way to their winter home. At this time of year, feed the birds high energy foods such as fat balls and cheese, supplementing with fruits such as apples, grapes, and dried fruits. Good quality bird seed and dried meal worms are both appreciated by the birds, too. Water bowls should be cleaned daily if possible. Set your bird feeder where you can see it out your window so that you can watch the birds enjoying their feast.

  Plant a Meadow :

If you have an area in your garden that has been neglected for a while, consider clearing off the grass and sow native flower and grass seeds. Once the area grows, birds will enjoy eating the insects
they find and some ground nesting birds may find a home.



  Happy Autumn!


   Cindy Crump

Saturday 3 October 2015

Gardeners Gold

Gardener’s gold

Autumn is a busy time of year in the garden.  But the falling leaves are a valuable resource not to be wasted. If left to decompose, they turn into leaf mould and over time produce a wonderful compost. 

Oak, beech and hornbeam leaves make the best quality leafmould and break down the quickest.  Thicker leaves such as sycamore, walnut, horse chestnut and sweet chestnut take longer.  Conifer and evergreen leaves can take 2-3 years to decompose, so are best avoided unless you’re very patient!

Collect leaves when they are wet, or sprinkle with water to dampen them and leave them in a shady spot in an out of the way corner.  If you have the room you can buy or make a wire mesh container for your leaves. Otherwise you can buy purpose-made sacks made from loosely woven jute from most garden centres now.  They hold an amazing amount of leaves and have the added advantage of being bio-degradable.    Or place your leaves into a large, black polythene sack such as a bin liner.  You will need to punch a few holes in the sides and bottom of it or your leaves will become a slimy mess. Tie the top loosely.  Bear in mind that the volume of leaves will reduce to between a quarter and a third as it becomes leafmould. You can’t possibly overdose your soil on it though so make as much as you can! Bags can be stacked if you’re short of space.
The leaves should have decomposed after about a year and you can use the resulting leafmould as a mulch.  After another year it can be dug in to improve your soil or even used as a seed sowing compost.

With autumn leaves in such plentiful supply why not work your own bit of magic? Turning nature’s discards into leafmould does feel a little like alchemy!

 



Tuesday 16 June 2015

Ruth Valerio, of A Rocha UK, speaking on consumerism at St Mary's Beaconsfield on Wed evening June 24th. 

 Dr. Ruth Valerio, Churches and Theology Director of A Rocha UK (one of our mission partners) and author of’ L is for Lifestyle’, will be speaking on 'Consumerism' at St Mary’s Beaconsfield on Wednesday 24th June, 8pm. This is part of their summer lecture series. Tickets are £5 (and include refreshments) and can be purchased on arrival at the church. For more details email office@stmarysbeaconsfield.org.uk or ring the Parish Office at 01494 676690


Ruth is Churches and Theology Director for A Rocha UK, http://arocha.org.uk  and she runs A Rocha's Living Lightly initiative. http://arocha.org.uk/our-activities/living-lightly   She is also a Director of Cred Jewellery, the world’s first fairtrade jewellery company.
Ruth has a theology degree from Cambridge and an MA from the London School of Theology, and has recently completed doctoral studies at Kings College London, looking at simplicity and consumerism.
She has written extensively on justice, environment and lifestyle issues, as well as writing Bible study guides for Scripture Union and CWR.
 Concerned to ‘practice what she preaches’, she has an allotment, runs a food cooperative and a pig-keeping social enterprise with friends. She is also very involved with Transition Chichester and runs the Chichester Garden Share scheme. She  writes a regular column in Families First magazine, as well as writing for magazines such as Christianity and Third Way.

She lives with her husband and two daughters in Chichester, where she is part of Revelation Church, leading a cell group and preaching regularly.


Wednesday 13 May 2015

Care for God's Creation by considering what you eat

You might not realise it, but what you choose to eat can damage the planet. The processes involved in moving our food from where it’s grown to our plates, packaging and preparing it all take enormous amounts of energy. And it's not news that the amount of meat and fish we eat is also damaging our planet - and our health.

The good news is that it is possible to eat a diet that's good for the planet. Eating more sustainably is a great way to feel better and care for God's creation too. But what is a sustainable diet?

- Eating more plant based foods

- Eating less and better meat and fish

- Eating more fresh food and less highly processed food

- Wasting less food

- Eating locally and seasonally

Where can I start?

One good place to start might be to try to eat less meat and fish – and it’s a great time to do just that because Friends of the Earth is running Meat Free May. There are lots of easy and tasty meat-free recipes, free tips and advice on the Friends of the Earth website that will help you: www.foe.co.uk/page/meat-free-may. You don’t have to sign up to go completely meat-free: just substituting some of the meat and fish you usually eat with something that’s grown more sustainably will help.

Why eat less meat?

The problem is not meat-eating per se but the scale on which we practise it. To keep up with demand livestock production has become highly intensive. Its dependence on oil-based fertilisers, chemicals and imported feed mean that it carries a particularly large carbon footprint.

Here are some facts:

In the last 50 years worldwide production of meat has quadrupled.

Livestock production is worse for the planet than trains or cars, causing between 14.5% and 21.5% of global greenhouse gas emissions, whereas transport accounts for around 13%.

70% of the deforestation of the Amazon has been caused by the livestock industry.

Over 70% of the world’s fish stocks are over or fully exploited.

Resources needed to create animal protein are enormous: it takes 54 calories of fuel energy to create one calorie of beef energy and each kilo of beef will additionally need 10 kilos of feed and 100,000 litres of water to produce.

75% of agricultural land in the EU is used for livestock production.

A vegetarian in the UK requires less than half the area of land to grow their food than someone following a conventional diet.

A shift to low-meat diets in the UK could prevent 45,000 early deaths each year.

Another interesting website: https://www.foe.co.uk/sites/default/files/downloads/flexitarianism-environmentally-friendly-diet-47222.pdf


Friday 13 March 2015

Fairtrade fortnight:Choose products that change lives

Fairtrade fortnight: Choose products that change lives

From 23 FEBRUARY – 8 MARCH thousands of events have been held across the UK to remind us to purchase fairly traded products wherever possible. 70% of the world’s food is produced by 500 million smallholder farmers yet many of them remain trapped in chronic poverty while shoppers enjoy the fruits of their labour. The Fairtrade system ensures farmers across the developing world receive a fair price for their work, as well as an additional Fairtrade Premium, used by farmers and workers to invest in their communities. The community then decides what the premium is spet on, whether that’s building a new school or hospital, or investing in better environmental business practices.

The UK is one of the world’s leading Fairtrade markets, with more products and more awareness of Fairtrade than anywhere else. Almost one in three bananas sold in the UK is Fairtrade. Fairtrade sales in the UK 2012 were £1.57bn. We have one of the most powerful networks of Fairtrade campaigners in the world, raising awareness about Fairtrade values in local communities and driving positive change for more than 1.5 million farmers, and their families, in developing countries. St James Church is a fair-trade church: we use Fairtrade coffee and tea at all our events. Emerging evidence through impact assessments has found that Fairtrade certification makes a significant difference to farmers’, workers’ and families’ lives. The benefits are economic, environmental and social.

There is an enormous range of Fairtrade products available, including clothing, jewellery, toys, homeware and gifts as well as groceries and household items so it is possible to make a large percentage of our shopping ethical. There are links for certain products from the Fairtrade website, but the largest range is available from Traidcraft plc, which is a trading company entirely dedicated to fair trade in that it applies fair trade principles across its full range of products. You can shop online: http://www.traidcraftshop.co.uk and also access their website from the Fairtrade website.

For more information on the range of products, see the Fairtrade website. http://www.fairtrade.org.uk (the range now includes fairly traded gold: say ‘I do’ with an ethically mined gold ring!)

If your local shop doesn’t offer Fairtrade products you can order leaflets explaining Fairtrade and giving them to the manager, while politely asking them to stock Fairtrade. And when they do, support them by telling others and buying fairtrade products.


Monday 9 February 2015

New Year, New Calculator


Did you make any New Year's resolutions this year? If you're still mulling it over, here's an idea - why not decide to offset your annual car mileage with Climate Stewards? The average annual mileage in the UK is 7,900 miles. If you'd like to see what that looks like in terms of CO2, head on over to the climate stewards site www.climatestewards.org and have a go with their brand new carbon calculator. They have rebuilt the calculator to add more options and to give you access to the latest Defra carbon factors

More and more organisations are realising that offsetting has a role to play in compensating for their impact on our planet. Many organisations have worked hard to reduce their carbon footprint, but some carbon emissions are inevitable if they are to do their jobs. Two UK partners, Tearfund and Wootton George Consulting, explain why they choose to offset with Climate Stewards:
"Tearfund is passionately committed to action on climate change, which hits the very poorest communities around the world in the countries where we work hardest and first. We help these communities to adapt to their changing climate, but also advocate for much more radical political action globally to tackle climate change. We seek to reduce our flights as much as we possibly can, but as an international development agency we will always have to make some flights. For those flights that are unavoidable we offset with Climate Stewards. We are pleased to work in partnership with Climate Stewards in this way and support their excellent work." Paul Cook, Advocacy Director.
Wooton George Consulting: "We are very aware that all business activity has an impact on the environment and, while we try to minimise this - for example by using public transport as much as possible - we also wanted to do something positive. In this regard our support for Climate Stewards helps us to do this. Not only does it help us offset out carbon impact, but it means we are helping a community in Africa. It's great to know that for every piece of work we do in the UK, a tree is being planted and maintained by local people in Ghana." Simon George, Director.