climate change

Passion for environment, humans, creativity motivates fashion revolution

Anna-Marie Janzen is the founder and operator of Reclaim Mending. (Photo by Anna-Marie Janzen)

Elise Epp is the country coordinator for Fashion Revolution Canada. (Supplied photo)

Jennifer DeGroot and her family run Big Oak Farm near Morden, Man. (Supplied photo)

Anna-Marie Janzen is the founder and operator of Reclaim Mending. (Photo by Anna-Marie Janzen

“An estimated 92 million tons of textile waste is created annually from the fashion industry,” Fashion Revolution reported in 2020, citing Global Fashion Agenda. “Every second, the equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned globally.”

‘We have no safe area under the sky’

Displaced by conflict and trapped by drought, this woman seeks water in the Afar region in northern Ethiopia. (UNICEF on Flickr.com / Creative Commons 2.0)

This UN-chartered ship left Ukraine on Aug. 16, carrying 23,000 tonnes of wheat bound for World Food Programme efforts in the Horn of Africa. (WFP/Anastasiia Honcharuk, used with permission)

For much of my life I associated Ethiopia with famine. I’m just old enough to recall the searing scenes from Ethiopia in the mid-1980s: windswept, dull-beige landscapes; skeletal cattle; distended bellies; flies; people crowding trucks laden with sacks of food; and charitable rock concerts.

Grace, guilt and CO2

(Gary Campbell-Hall on Flickr.com / Creative Commons 2.0)

1. Grace
There is more grace in the atmosphere than carbon dioxide.

That does not let anyone off the hook; it promises that we can face the grim fate of the Earth and the compromises of our lives without being utterly overwhelmed. (And it means I can break bread with sisters and brothers who do not believe there is a hook that anyone needs to be let off of.)

MC Canada issues call to eco-mission

A small, clogged and polluted creek in an urban section of the Haldimand Tract in southwestern Ontario. (Mennopix photo by Ross W. Muir)

Leaders of Mennonite Church Canada are calling on the members, congregations and regional churches of the nationwide church to respond to the climate emergency.

“We must act, we must act together, and we must act urgently,” write the executive ministers of Mennonite Church Canada, in a four-page document published on Feb. 7.

Food waste a resource for change

Women carefully close one of the inner layers of a PICS bag, which is designed to protect contents against insect damage. (International Institute of Tropical Agriculture photo / Creative Commons 2.0)

Humanity wastes 931 million tonnes of food each year. This figure—from the 2021 United Nations Environment Programme Food Waste Index Report—is an estimate with an admittedly wide margin of error, but it is probably the best of the wildly varying estimates of food waste in the media.

Warm but not fuzzy in 2050

Highway 1 in B.C. washed out by severe rain on Nov. 17. (B.C. Ministry of Transportation and Infrastructure photo (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0))

Flooding in B.C. on Nov 22. (Province of British Columbia photo (CC BY-NC-ND 2.0))

Climate change has been on the agenda of our global village for a generation. The science, the discourse and the mood have shifted over time. As has reality. What was once a dark cloud in the distance has become an atmospheric river overhead.

MC Canada urged to act for climate justice

The organizers of the “7 Calls to Climate Action for Mennonite Church Canada,” from top to bottom, left to right: Steve Heinrichs, Mona Neufeld and Josiah Neufeld, Mark Bigland-Pritchard, Anna Bigland-Prichard, Katie Goerzen-Sheard, Justin Sun and Will Braun.

At the beginning of November, thousands of people from across the globe gathered at the COP26 Climate Summit in Glasgow, Scotland, to address the climate crisis.

A new call for MC Canada

Steve Heinrichs, Will Braun, Jennifer deGroot, Mona Neufeld and Doug Klassen stand outside Mennonite Church Canada during a meeting related to the 7 Calls to Action for Mennonite Church Canada grassroots effort. (Photo courtesy of Facebook.com/7callstoclimateaction)

The Earth is in trouble. As I write, international leaders, scientists and activists are meeting in Glasgow, Scotland, for COP26, a forum discussing actions the worldwide community must take to address the ongoing effects of climate change, effects that threaten every creature on our planet.

Creation care resource a timely tool for congregations

Joanne Moyer, second from right in the middle row, stands with students from the King’s University in 2019. Hanna Groot, third from left in the front row, and Anna Pattison, second from left in the back row, contributed to the resource “God’s Green Church.” (Photo courtesy of Mennonite Church Canada)

Senior environmental studies students from The King’s University in Edmonton have compiled a creation care resource for Mennonite Church Canada congregations.

Mennonite organizations look to help with B.C. forest fires

A July 1 satellite image of the forest fire that destroyed much of the village of Lytton, B.C., this summer. (Antti Lipponen image / Creative Commons Licence (http://bit.ly/cclicence2-0))

When the village of Lytton, B.C,. was nearly destroyed by wildfires in mid-August, Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) B.C. was among those that moved to help. This is one of more than 260 fires in the province this summer that have burned 650,000 hectares, with hot temperatures, dry conditions and high winds exacerbating the situation.

Making a difference

Grow Hope Niagara

Forty-one acres in Campden, Ont., are being cultivated, planted and harvested for the Canadian Foodgrains Bank, with sponsorships of $400 an acre helping to plant a crop for the Grow Hope Niagara project. When the harvest is sold, farmers will donate the money to the Foodgrains Bank through Mennonite Central Committee.

What does UN ‘peace’ mean?

(Image by Arek Socha/Pixabay)

“Making Peace with Nature” is the peculiar title of a scientific report recently tabled by the United Nations. That’s an attention-getting title for a peace-church eco-geek. My inquiring mind begs to know: How does the UN conceptualize “peace with nature” and how does its version compare with an Anabaptist understanding? 

'Be It Resolved' released

(Photo courtesy of Steve Heinrichs)

A new anthology published by Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Canada and Mennonite Church Canada hit the press this fall. Be it Resolved: Anabaptists & Partner Coalitions Advocate for Indigenous Justice, 1966-2020 is a collection of more than 90 documents detailing commitments Anabaptists have made to Indigenous justice and decolonization since the 1960s.

What is nature to you?

The shortest route from Wopisa-Gabriyèl to get medical assistance requires descending this waterfall. (MCC photo by Ted Oswald, 2017)

If you’ve ever invited me to go camping with you, you’ll know I’m not exactly what you would call “outdoorsy.” I enjoy nature, but I don’t really see the need to sleep in it, much less in a stuffy tent with sticks and rocks poking into my back. I feel the same about hiking—I’m just fundamentally unable to understand the appeal of walking for hours through the woods, tripping on rocks and being pestered by insects, just to turn around and walk back again, having accomplished nothing but getting myself exhausted and sweaty?

Prayer for the List of Coming Disasters

'This is a prayer we are reluctant to pray because it is so hard to name what we fear out loud... We feel so small in the story of the world, and yet our actions have such big consequences.' (Image by Tumisu/Pixabay)

This is a prayer we are reluctant to pray
because it is so hard to name what we fear out loud.
We go through our days trying to pretend
that life as normal will continue forever,
but that is harder and harder to sustain.
And so we need this prayer where we lay out
the disaster of climate change to you, Lord, and to each other:
the loss of species never to be seen again,
the bleaching of the coral reefs,
the submersion of coastal regions,
the dislocation of populations,

Why I care about climate change

Dann and Joji Pantoja with their seven grandchildren. (Photo courtesy of Dann Pantoja)

My peace and reconciliation ministry is motivated ultimately by my love of the Creator, my service to Christ and my submission to the Comforter. Yet, I also have familial motivations for the vision, mission and activities to which I’m committed—they are my family, especially my grandchildren. 

What I’m doing now is a grandfather’s attempt to contribute to the care and sustainability of this planet, for their future. 

I pray for my grandchildren as they grow up on a planet going through ecological crises because of climate change.

Pastors prepare to become climate leaders

Warmed by a campfire and the scent of wood smoke, pastors prepare for a forest church experience outdoors. (Photo by Jennifer Schrock)

Wendy Janzen, centre, leads the group’s worship services. Janzen pastors at St. Jacobs Mennonite Church, Ont., and leads the Burning Bush Forest Church, which worships outdoors. (Photo by Jennifer Schrock)

Hopelessness. Denial. Grief. Guilt. Despair. Pastors face these emotions in their congregations as they walk with people suffering from personal losses.

Rooted and Grounded speakers call for changed worldviews

Ken Quiring, pastor of Grace Mennonite Church in Brandon, Man., and a member of the Network of Biblical Storytellers, give a presentation on biblical storytelling and creation care stories, and presented Scripture for a number of the worship sessions during AMBS’s Rooted and Grounded conference. (Photo by Perdian Tumanan)

Randy Woodley, distinguished professor of faith and culture and director of intercultural and Indigenous studies at George Fox University/Portland (Oregon) Seminary, gives a keynote address on ‘Resurrecting ancient wisdom and worldview.’ (Photo by Perdian Tumanan)

Karenna Gore of Union Theological Seminary in New York City gives a keynote address on ‘A moral framework for concern about climate and related environmental issues.’ (Photo by Perdian Tumanan)

Valerie Bridgeman, dean and vice-president for academic affairs at Methodist Theological School in Ohio, give a keynote address entitled ‘If only: Learning from creation.’ (Photo by Perdian Tumanan)

As the floodwaters of Hurricane Florence crested in South Carolina in late September, three keynote speakers at this year’s Rooted and Grounded conference on land and Christian discipleship at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary (AMBS) told participants that shifts in the dominant western belief systems and priorities would be needed for people to live in right relationship with God’s creati

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