Creation Care Alliance of Western North Carolina
CCA to present at the Wild Goose Festival!
The Creation Care Alliance will have the privilege to share some of our work to a wider national audience at the Wild Goose Festival this Summer. The Wild Goose Festival is a Spirit, Justice, Music and Arts Festival hosted in Hot Springs, NC July 11-14th. The Creation Care Alliance will be offering “Creation Care: Practicing Love-Practical Seeds for Change” outlining our Creation Care Toolkit. The team will also offer “Role Playing for a Healthy Planet-Climate Interactive.” We are excited to collaborate with North Carolina Interfaith Power and Light and to connect with one another and the incredible wealth of wisdom and creativity sure to be present at the Goose! See more below about details.
Also if you are interested in volunteering to help support Wild Goose through a CCA Collaborative effort email Scott@creationcarealliance.org or Sign up here.
It’s a place where all kinds of people come together, not only to hear great music and incredible speakers, but also to dive into lively conversations with thought leaders, writers, dreamers, artists, visionaries, social justice activists, peace-makers…the ones you’ll find on the official program, and the ones you might meet while just getting lunch or hanging out by the river. It’s also a place where you can be a spectator, but where you can be a co-creator as well. A place where we affirm the creativity in all of us, and opportunities to make art and music, to tell stories and take in stories, can be found around every corner.
It’s transformational, experiential, it’s a sing and dance and play and dream and eat and camp and meditate and talk and listen and twirl-you-around-and-shake-you-up gathering, born out of the “Wild Goose” spirit metaphor which is all about beauty, grace, and yes, unpredictability. We also take inspiration from events such as, Greenbelt, Burning Man, Lightning In a Bottle and SXSW.
It is a place where all are welcome. Seriously, ALL. Because we are rooted in a progressive Christian tradition, we welcome you, whatever your age, race, culture, gender, marital status, sexual orientation, religious tradition, disabilities, different abilities, whether you have money or not, whether you have a degree or not, whether you have a strong faith or no faith, or perhaps a billion questions about faith, whether you have a home or not, whether you’re an extrovert or introvert, everyone is welcome here. Even eye-rolling teenagers. And rambunctious little kids. Rambunctiousness is, in fact, encouraged. We welcome all to come and seek the common good together.
PRACTICING SHALOM IN OUR TIME OF CLIMATE CHANGE
PRACTICING SHALOM IN OUR TIME OF CLIMATE CHANGE Wednesdays, April 24 – May 15
6:00 – 7:00 p.m. | Crouch Chapel First Baptist Church of Asheville 5 Oak Street, Asheville, NC 28801 ca.net
We are happy to present this 4-part series for our church and our community to examine climate change. We will consider its effects on our world, and explore the role of our Christian faith in response.
Join us as leaders share their expertise.
April 24 – “Living in this time of Climate Change”
Deke Arndt, Chief, Monitoring Branch, National Center for Environmental Information, NOAA
From his experience as a climate scientist with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Deke will speak to us about the recent report from the National Climate Assessment, helping us understand major points of interest. Additionally, he will speak to conditions we might expect in the Southeastern US with regard to climate change. We are fortunate to have Deke share his scientific expertise with us.
May 1 – “Practicing Shalom in Climate Change”
Rev. Nancy Sehested, Co-pastor, Circle of Mercy Congregation
Nancy will lead us in an exploration of the relationship between our faith and climate change. glean from our Scriptures that speak to this issue? How are we then called to respond?
May 8 – “Asheville Responds”
A Panel of Local Leaders:
Sophie Mullinax, Blue Horizons Project, Coordinator
Dawn Chavez, Asheville Greenworks, Director
Scott Hardin-Nieri, Mountain True, Director of Creation Care Alliance
What can we learn from these community leaders, we will learn of their e orts in Asheville and Buncombe County to mitigate climate change. Additionally, they will help us know ways we can participate with them or on an individual basis to make a positive difference in combating climate change.
May 15 – “First Baptist Responds” Dr. Mack Dennis, Pastor
Mack will give an overview of ways our church has already taken steps to reduce our energy consumption and live more sustainably. Where do we go from here? Mack will share ideas that are being explored and visions for our future of ways we can help as we live in this time of climate change.
Project Drawdown Workshop-Hendersonville
On April 16, MountainTrue, the Creation Care Alliance of WNC and the Citizens’ Climate Lobby of Henderson County are proud to co-sponsor the Introduction to Project Drawdown workshop – a workshop sharing what international researchers have identified as the one-hundred most impactful solutions to reverse climate change. The event will be held from 5:30 P.M. – 7:00 P.M. at the Morris Kaplan Auditorium in the Henderson County Library.
This event is designed for individuals and groups who are ready to identify personal and family solutions to global warming that are within reach, and/or have an interest in working with community organizations and local governments to implement climate solutions and policies. Social and eco-justice advocates Pam and Charley Rogers will lead the workshop.
The workshop is based on the book, Drawdown: The Most Comprehensive Plan Ever Proposed to Reduce Global Warming, edited by environmentalist Paul Hawken. The book features the work of more than 200 researchers and scientists who have mapped, measured and modeled the top 100 solutions to reverse global warming, concluding that we can begin a reversal of greenhouse gases by 2050 using existing technologies.
Gardner-Webb University Caring for Creation
BOILING SPRINGS, N.C.—Gardner-Webb University is celebrating Creation Care/Earth Week this week with a series of programs to highlight the ways people of faith can preserve the integrity, beauty, and health of God’s creation. CCA is excited to participate with the Earth Week Festivities, Tuesday we will have the opportunity to share during the Dimensions worship service and the Earth Fare on Thursday will focus on Bees and Pollinators! Read more here
Earth Day Vigil-“Walking the Path”
Sunday, April 28, 2019
4:15pm-5pm Walking the Labyrinth 5:30 p.m.-Vigil with Reception to follow
First Baptist Church
Sacred Garden/Labyrinth
5 Oak Street, Asheville, NC 28801
Often times, we cannot fully see the destination in our ecological, social and spiritual paths. Despite the obscurity of the destination it is important to take steps toward a healthier future. This step by step movement is what has inspired the theme of the Earth Day Vigil this year. The Labyrinth location at First Baptist Church will provide an embodied way to experience a spiritual invitation to move toward a healthier planet. While there are many ways to interact with a labyrinth there are 4 basic movements that might give us hints during this Earth Month. The movements as taught by the Veriditas School based in Grace Cathedral in San Francisco can be named Remember, Release, Receive and Return. On Sunday, April 28th the Labyrinth will be open at First Baptist at 4:15 with a vigil to follow at 5:30pm. Volunteer to help here.
The time will have Words of reflection and blessings delivered by Rev. Carol Hovis from Grace Covenant Presbyterian Church, Rev. Nancy Walton of Trinity United Methodist Church, Rev. Tommy Bratton and Marian Sadler Arledge of First Baptist Church, Rev. Scott Hardin-Nieri of the Creation Care Alliance of WNC, Dr. Hun Lye, Founder and Spiritual Director of Urban Dharma, and Isa Whitaker a member of the Islamic Center of Asheville and the Community Garden Network Coordinator at Bountiful Cities. Sound and musical leadership will be offered by Jenna Lindbo from Land of the Sky United Church of Christ, Daniel Barber from the Jubilee! Community and Joe Hallock of Solar Powered Sound.
Please join people of various faith communities from across WNC as we:
-
- Celebrate the beauty of creation
- Share our gratitude and appreciation for the earth
- Enjoy music, poetry, and prayer
- Grieve for the damage we are causing to creation and our neighbors
- Reflect on our responsibility to our children and future generations
- Resolve to bring our hope and faith into action
- Enjoy food and drink and connect with great people
Fossil Free Presbyterians reflect on Clergy Retreat
Farmers, faith leaders and scientists came together at the Creation Care Alliance of Western North Carolina‘s clergy retreat in January. They explored how the damage the Dust Bowl caused a climate scientist’s family farm affected his outlook, the connection between climate change and the Sabbath, stories of first understanding climate change and more.
We offer gratitude for these words from Rev. Jess Rigel
Spirit and World Climate- Climate Interactive Role Playing
Build hope and possibility for a sustainable climate: Join Creation Care Alliance and Mountaintrue at First Congregational Church to play a climate solutions game! This will be a great opportunity for you, your green team/creation care team, and congregational leadership to connect with other people who are engaged in or are curious about climate work. Let us know you are coming to this free event here.
March 31 @ 5:30 pm – 7:30 pm
First Congregational Church Fellowship Hall Downstairs
20 Oak St, Asheville, NC 28801
Play the role of global leaders engaging in UN Climate Negotiations as you simulate scenarios of success in a powerful computer model used by top global leaders. This game will allow you to explore what it will actually take to address climate change. Creation Care Alliance Director Scott Hardin-Nieri, and MountainTrue staff members Rhys Burns and Catie Morris will lead the event and guide you on your way to a restored climate. This is part of the Faith Track within The Climate City Expo offered by the Collider. There will be snacks and drinks.
Climate Interactive is a think tank that develops simulation tools to help people explore what works to address climate change and other systemic challenges. From their office at the Collider, they have worked closely with top decision-makers from the UN, US Congress, and other governments around the world and have published in the NY Times, Washington Post, and other media outlets. Climate leaders in over 85 countries have participated in their games. Learn more with this brief video.
Sign up for this free event here.
Youth: Listening to those who stand to lose so much
Posted on by Scott Hardin-Nieri
I quickly told him about you and the many other people and congregations who are seeking right relationship with people, planet, and the Divine.
This Friday, youth in Western North Carolina will join a growing movement of teenagers and children who are seeking to accelerate progress on climate action. The rallies, marches and school strikes in the US represent just a fraction of the global action, with young voices being lifted in forty countries. Youth as well as adults have been inspired by 15-year-old Greta Thunberg, a Swedish student whose weekly school strikes have won a global following. Greta’s decision to skip school and bike to Stockholms’ Parliament House with a hand painted “School Strike for Climate” sign reveals a growing impatience with the current leadership and continues to inspire tangible change. Among the many powerful demands from the US students that resonate with me are the calls for “an equitable transition for marginalized communities that will be most impacted by climate change and an equitable transition for fossil-fuel reliant communities to a renewable economy.”
We know that the young people who are courageously speaking out this week are among those with the most to lose in the years and decades to come. I am standing in solidarity with them this week, and encourage young people and adult allies to attend the Asheville Climate Strike Rally in Pritchard Park on March 15 at 4:30.
We cannot do this work alone and recognize that human and ecological connections are at the root of our future. Tonight the “Hidden Life of Trees” book study at Jubilee at 6pm will give you some time with like-minded and hearted humans. If not tonight, see below for other ways to connect.
Read More
Category: Congregational Stories, Presentations & Webinars, Public Comments & Testimony Tags: 100% renewable, children, clean energy, climate activism, climate change, compassion, Creation Care, Energy Efficiency, faith, food security, justice, science, social justice, Spirituality, students, us climate strike, youth