CREATION CARE RECAP

April:

• "A Fast for the Earth." Weekly Lenten meetups continued Saturdays at 3:30pm through Easter. The final week of the fast was an ignorance fast. Sunday April 4th we celebrated a resurrection feast which invited us to share in locally sourced foods. At the cross walk Challah bread slices (made with many Meadow View Farm eggs, King Arthur Flour, and sprinkled with poppy seeds grown in our 2020 church garden) were available to take home.
• We participated in Interfaith Power & Light's (IPL) Earth Week. The theme was "Sacred Ground: Cultivating Connections between our Faith, our Food, and the Climate." We created opportunities to watch the IPL recommended film: Kiss the Ground
• We were invited to dinner and a movie in celebration of Earth Day. A virtual Cookbook Club Dinner (zucchini shakshuka, recipe from Sustainable Kitchen) & Kiss the Ground film discussion was held jointly over Zoom with Ambler Mennonite. 
• 

May:

• Wild Church resumes!
  • Mother's Day service has a record 38 people attending, 14 of whom were children. We planted oaks trees, a keystone species.

• • Pentecost Sunday was a windy, wet Wild Church. 11 gathered for a meaningful service as we reflected on the Holy Spirit and the birthday of the church. We planted 1 square meter of native plants around our new oak, a shared practice being done this month by MCCN congregations across the US and Canada.

• Wild Church: theming around seeds and the parable of the sower. Kids planted a three sisters garden (corn, beans, squash) which is a symbiotic planting attributed to native peoples.

• MOSAIC MENNONITES newsletter. We were the lead article in their June 10th edition: Church Gone Wild. We have already received inquiries from other Mosaic congregations that are curious to learn more.

• Stuff Swap: If you have items to give-away or are looking for something in particular, we can be resources for each other. Let Steve know your desired or donated item(s) and he will post in his weekly email in hopes to find a match!
• Share the Harvest table: Every Wild Church will have a table set up for giving and gleaning extra plants, produce, food stuff, or other items that you wish to share with others.
• Plastic bag donations! Nancy Pejouhy has been collecting our plastic bags and other plastic film in collaboration with the Bethel schools as part of the community recycling challenge sponsored by Trex. 500 pounds of plastic film or bags collected= 1 Trek bench! We've helped created 2 benches already and it is on to #3... and this one is earmarked for our church gardens!! Drop off clean plastic bags of all shapes/sizes at the church. Here is guidance on what to donate 

• Climate Ride The Center for Sustainable Climate Solutions "Moving the Story" cross country bike ride is in progress! Denver Beck and Samantha Lioi are both riders with connections to our community. Denver wrote this week's reflection. You can follow them as they go by signing up for regular updates.
• Climate Action Plans  MCCN offers up a resource from the Center for Sustainable Climate Solutions. Blueprints for Climate Action- creation care actions plans to empower congregations. We can take the quiz, keeping in mind the congregation, then get an action plan appropriate to where we are at. Scores range from 0-20. (If you take the quiz, please send what score you came up with to Heather for compiling.)
• Wild Church Network leaders monthly meeting. reoccurs the second thursdays of each month. Introductions are made by sharing your name, your congregation's name, your watershed and giving a land acknowledgement.
  • our watershed:  Ottaquechee watershed which flows into the greater Connecticut watershed
  • our land acknowledgement: we meet on the ancestral lands of the Western Abenaki.