In the 2023-2024 Conference year, the NCCUMC Creation Care Committee has been engaged in a broad range of activities and initiatives. Our focus this year has been three-fold: 1) to encourage the establishment of local church creation care teams; 2) to encourage the use of the Green Church Initiative throughout the Conference; and 3) to create a tool for tracking local churches’ carbon emissions, in order to establish a baseline for the Conference.
To assist with the growing of local church creation care teams, the committee offered a grant to assist local churches in either forming a new team, or taking a next step with an existing team. Through this program, we were able to award grants to seven churches and one conference camp, totaling $5,000 in grant money. We are excited to have welcomed new churches as Certified Green Churches this year, and with the help of some of these churches, we are in the process of simplifying the GCI application for future churches.
Additionally, new district creation care teams have been formed in the past year, the Creation Care committee had a presence at Pilgrimage where we engaged with youth, and creation care practices were included in leadership training webinars in January. Our book discussion group continues to meet monthly, we have hosted advocacy Zoom trainings, and members of our team have been active in advocacy at the state and national levels. In September, we hosted four webinars throughout the month for the Season of Creation.