Mennonite Church Canada is hosting a new online community learning series. “Creator’s Call in a Climate Emergency” starts on Jan. 20 and lasts eight weeks.
Co-hosted by the national church’s Indigenous-Settler Relations office and Sustainability Leadership Group, the series is open to anyone wishing to learn about decarbonization and decolonization as ways forward for the church in the current climate emergency.
“Climate scientists warn that we have just eight years to halve our greenhouse gas emissions if we are to prevent catastrophic warming,” says Steve Heinrichs, director of Indigenous-Settler Relations. “Indigenous peoples are calling us to a radically new relationship with the earth as they defend land and waters at great cost. This series is a way of asking, ‘What is the Spirit saying to today’s church?’”
Participants will read Seth Klein’s book, A Good War: Mobilizing Canada for the Climate Emergency, and other supplementary readings. Participants will also engage in conversation with climate action leaders and Indigenous activists.
Ian Funk, a member of MC Canada’s Sustainability Leadership Group and pastor at Langley Mennonite Fellowship in B.C., will co-host the series with Heinrichs.
“I pray that we as a church can imagine our story to be one where we have a deep and spiritual connection with Creation, where God is incarnate in all things,” Funk says. “My prayer is that this story is awakened within us, in our faith and in the way that we live as we read A Good War together.”
The series runs from Jan. 20 to March 17, 2022, on Thursday evenings from 7:00 p.m. to 8:30 p.m (CST), with a one-week break halfway through.
For the first half of the series, participants will engage in breakout-room discussions. The next half will allow participants to hear from Klein and other special guests, including:
- Sarah Augustine, founder of Dismantling the Doctrine of Discovery Coalition and author of The Land is Not Empty;
- Eriel Tchekwie Deranger, executive director of Indigenous Climate Action;
- Leah Gazan, MP for Winnipeg Centre;
- Jen Gobby, author of More Powerful Together: Conversations with Climate Activists and Indigenous Land Defenders.
Klein’s book is available to order through CommonWord or wherever books are sold.
Meetings will take place on Zoom. For more information and to register, visit mennonitechurch.ca/community-learning-series.
Steve Heinrichs, director of Indigenous-Settler Relations for MC Canada, will co-host a learning series on the climate crisis based on the book, ‘A Good War.’ (Photo courtesy of Instagram.com/heinrichs_steve)
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