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Green Anglicans “Movers and Shakers” Camp The weekend of September 19 to September 21 marked the first Green Anglican Camp in Glencairn, attracting members of the Dioceses of Cape Town, Saldanha Bay, and False Bay. The weekend paralleled the Climate March in New York, where more than 400,000 people showed in support of new standards and demands at the UN Climate Summit. The camp was held at Glencairn, surrounded by wetlands, mountain and ocean, and was an awesome setting to experience God’s creation. On the first day, campers learned about the surrounding ecosystems with a devotional walk led by Fr. Bob Commin, we spent time in the wetlands leading to the ocean and practiced personal prayer, taking in the sound and feeling of nature while having a conversation with God. We then proceeded to pick up litter along the beach and train tracks, as a way to join the worldwide Climate March and do our part in beautifying God’s creation. Our afternoon was filled with opportunities – we headed to Simon’s Town, we were met by a boat where we were able to see some sea life, followed by a talk about the status of the marine conservation and protected areas, we were also able to experience some of the other services at the marina, like the National Sea Rescue Institute. For me a personal highlight as a new arrival from the US was interacting with the African penguins! On the final day we ended with a labyrinth walk through the beautiful vegetation in the shade of the mountains. It was great to see the diversity of the group who bonded through prayer, walking, and laughter. There was a real sense of excitement about bringing the lessons back to churches and dioceses and to share a better understanding of the environment and the challenges of climate change. Everyone was able to share the strategies they learned and their plans to improve the practices and understanding of the environment at their own churches. It’s fantastic to see so many people inspired to be a change and make a difference to keep our ecosystems healthy. The youth really want to make a difference and reach out to make others be stewards of the environment as well. A few comments from some of the campers “All my life I didn’t care about animals and I never appreciated the importance of the creation of god especially the trees”. “I learnt about the importance of the sea, life and how they are becoming extinct and that it’s different from farming because we don’t plough back there we just take, take and never think about the future and food becoming more expensive.” “We may speak different languages, come from different cultures but our love for ministry and God are the same. Our hearts beats as one.”   Willie Lutes is an intern with Green Anglicans from the Diocese of South Dakota. He is part of the Young Adult Service Corps of the Episcopal Church.

“Many young people at one point of their lives are trying to find the answers to the problems created by the men who God created.” – Anonymous On the weekend of the 25-27 July 2014, young people around the Cape Town Diocese gathered at Manyano Campsite in Paarl. This assembly was to have fun and get young people talking about the issues they saw as key areas for the Diocese to focus on at the Synod in August. This was pretty slick that the Youth had invited the Green Anglicans Environmental Network team to presenting about Young Green Anglicans and things to consider for the young people to partake within the diocese. The Anglican Communion states that the fifth mark of mission is ‘to strive to safeguard the integrity of creation in sustaining and renewing the earth’ What makes a Young Anglican Green? Worship: – organise green events at church or youth to celebrate the environment. Personal lifestyle: – reducing their carbon footprint with actions such as; Transport, Water, Electricity, Litter and Simple lifestyle- is worth living Jesus did. Action and Advocacy: – a Young Green Anglican would inform themselves about issues like green energy, fracking, nuclear power as well as get involved with local clean up days and any campaigns about the environment. God created us to take care of his earth and not for us to destroy it – Jason (Cape Town Youth) Things To Consider When Hosting An Event: Have a green team Have bins for Cans, Paper, Plastic, Compost and non recyclable waste, e.g. Styrofoam. If possible make an A5 booklet rather than loose one-sided paper. Make sure of the numbers so food is not wasted. -Jonathan Hobosch

An era of Young Green Anglicans has begun one year after Revd. Rachel Mash presented at last year’s Provincial Youth Consultation (PYC) which was held in the Diocese of Lesotho. This year’s Provincial Youth Consultation was hosted by the Diocese of Kimberly and Kuruman and didn’t they go all out in helping to be good stewards for the environment!!. The pictures displays Jonathan ‘Mr. Green lantern’ Ho’Bosch who saved paper by manually printing back to back 70 copies. The next picture is the Diocese of K&K’s display of recycling information done by Thuto. We had Revd. Gabriel Barnett and his young people with ‘Mr. Green Lantern’ do some sorting of waste after visiting the Big Hole. (Picture:   Green Environmental Network Jonathan Ho’Bosch, Revd. Rachel Mash, Nina Pretorius and Ncumisa Magadla receiving their flagship from the Western Cape Premier Helen Zille on Mandela Day at Spier in Stellenbosch. “It’s not hard to go green, it just wants one to start caring for what God blessed us with”- Thuto Makgoe a Young Green Anglican in Kimberly. Things To Consider When Hosting An Event:  Have a green team Have bins for Cans, Paper, Plastic, Compost and unrecyclable waste, eg. Styrofoam.  If possible make an A5 booklet rather than loose one-sided paper.  Make sure of the numbers so food is not wasted -Jonathan Ho’ Bosch  

Anglican Church is awarded “110% Green flagship status!” On Mandela day (18th July) the Premier, Helen Zille, awarded the Anglican Church a flagship as part of the 110% Green initiative ran by the Western Cape Government. A flagship is given to an organisation that has made an outstanding commitment towards educating about environmental awareness as well as contributing to the green economy. The event was held in Spier Wine Farm, Stellenbosch in collaboration with the Mandela Day 67 minutes of community service.  The Environmental Desk at the provincial office (Green Anglicans) attended the event to receive the flagship from the premier but were also involved in different groups which looked at sustainable ways of living. As a highlight of the day a “Food Forward” project was launched on the same day to “raise awareness around food wastage, catalyse action and reduce inefficiencies within the food value chain.” Here are a few shocking facts regarding food wastage: Almost a third of national food production is wasted in South Africa ( 9 million tonnes) – this is the weight of  1.6 million elephants! Meanwhile over 11 million South Africans go hungry. The water we waste every year could fill 600,000 Olympic sized swimming pools, whereas 9 million families don’t have access to clean drinking water. The project aims to encourage a reduction of food wastage in the Western Cape Province, by mobilising key stakeholders to decrease inefficiencies at every stage of THE FOOD CHAIN, from production all the way through to consumption. This project is endorsed by 110% Green initiative which encourages all Anglicans not to waste food. -Ncumisa Magadla

DIOCESE OF LESOTHO ENVIRONMENTAL CONFERENCE The Diocese of Swaziland held its first Environmental Conference hosted by Bishop Adam Taaso on the 30th May and 1st of June 2014. Our guest speakers were Rev Dr Rachel Mash, provincial environmental Coordinator and Canon Dr Andrew Warmback, Natal Diocesan Coordinator. We were blessed to be joined by Rev Sam Sifuleni, Diocesan Coordinator from the Diocese of Harare. The conference was organised by Mr Tumelo Hoohlo and his able team! WHAT WILL BE THE IMPACT OF CLIMATE CHANGE IN  LESOTHO? Rev Dr Rachel Mash “Lesotho is categorized as one of the countries highly vulnerable to the impact of climate change, deserving special attention” (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change) The first session considered the environmental challenges faced by Lesotho: Generally there will be an increase in extreme weather events: longer droughts and heavier rain and storms. Reduced rainfall will affects the production of crops.  The country will experience frequent droughts that result in poor harvests and large livestock losses to rural farmers, exacerbating poverty and suffering. Higher temperatures will lead to  more pests. There may be up to 25% decrease in maize yield. Increase of alien plant species , less irrigation and drinking water available. As well as these, Lesotho will experience increased flooding and drought, damage to infrastructure , loss of crops , community displacement. Heavy snowfalls, strong winds and floods  pose devastating social impacts . USING OUR LAND FOR ORGANIC FARMING : Mr Henry Ramapeile Our country is the way it is today because of our cruelty.  We plough our fields, our soil would be rich, but today because of our cruelty to the soil itself, in the sense that we use chemical fertilizers, those micro organisms are dead. That is why you see poor growth unlike 50 years ago when you saw rich vegetation and rich crops  God gave us everything, we are poor because we want to be poor. Kitchen garbage is gold! You can make a liquid fertilizer. Organic farming is important because it is a cheaper way of improving soil fertility using local resources. It uses minimum tillage with minimum soil disturbance. There is no  use of poisons or chemicals in pest control. Organic farming needs less water than conventional methods—an adaptation strategy for climate change ECO-THEOLOGY—Canon Andrew Warmback, Diocesan Environmental Coordinator, Natal Diocese What does the Bible say? Canon Andrew shared several of the passages which can be used for sermons. Gen 1:1-5: Creation –  God created—and the Spirit of God was hovering ,  what do we say every Sunday? – “ We believe in God creator of Heaven and Earth” Gen 9:8-13: After the flood, God makes a covenant.  All living creatures are included. We will never be destroyed again. Isaiah 24:3-7: Prophet –  devastation and curse upon the land. If we turn away from God, the earth becomes like a desert. Mark 4:30-32: Mustard seed: spiritual growth is like the growth of a tree Mark 4: 35-39: Calming of the storm. – Jesus has a close relationship with nature –  he walks by the lake, prays by the mountain (small carbon footprint) kingdom like a mustard seed, he pointed people to nature to help them understand God. Love your neighbor, which can be a human or a lake. Rev 22:1-2: The vision of the end is of rivers of water, trees and human life.  Some theology says destroy this earth we will have a new heaven and a new earth. But Revelations shows that the new heaven is here on earth—earth renewed Mark 16: 15: Preach the good news to ALL creation!  Not just to the humans. We need a born again world, redemption for all creation. Other teaching and theology: The fifth mark of mission of the Anglican Communion says “To strive to safeguard the integrity of creation and sustain and renew the life of the earth” . There is a “Green bible’ which has the words of scripture in green. (like the red letter Bible). Liberation theology-  exodus story is for all of human communities. “Cry of the poor, cry of the earth”. Feminist theology – have a theology that affirms the feminine. HOW CAN WE RESPOND? Rev Rachel Mash Simply put, we need to “Love the Earth as much as God does “ Archbishop Emeritus Tutu Becoming an Eco-congregation involves three things Worship, Local Church action and Advocacy Worship: In our worship, we need to preach , pray and include the care for creation in our liturgies. We can ‘get out of the box’ with outdoor services. We can celebrate environmental days such as World Environment Day, Water week, Season of Creation, Arbor week, St Francis day. Young people can get involved with dramas, dance, poetry or music. Local church: we need to consider our water use, mending taps, putting in a water barrel. We can look at using our land for organic farming to create jobs and food. We need to consider waste, by recycling and composting. We can have outreaches into our community – clean up days, tree planting. Advocacy: we need to act nationally or regionally on issues such as climate change, renewable energy, pollution etc.   The day ended with a solemn vow being made,led by Bishop Taaso “We the clergy and laity of the Diocese of Lesotho after this environmental conference held at Durham Link on the 31 May 2014, at which we were reminded of our responsibility towards the environment :Do commit ourselves to becoming more environmentally friendly, to preserve and look after it and to do all those things which will turn the environment back to what it looked and appeared like when God put us in charge of it.So help us God.”