What does is mean to be a Green Chalice Congregation?

What does being a “Green Chalice congregation” mean? And what is Green Chalice?
 
    Green Chalice is an environmental committee made up of DOC members that works to improve their church’s environmental education, eco-friendliness, and pollution reduction. The mission of Green Chalice is to connect Christian faith, spiritual practice, and creation consciousness in order to demonstrate the fullness of God’s peace. The main goal is to have each Green Chalice DOC church be carbon neutral by 2030 and completely carbon negative by 2035. This will allow us as Christians, to better follow what the Bible says about caring for all of creation, and will also allow us as humans to ease the environmental damage that we are contributing to the Earth.

    Both creation care and carbon goals are very important, but why exactly are they important to others? Why do we need the whole congregation involved? Why can’t the Green Chalice chapters just handle it themselves? There’s a very simple reason. It's that we need every single FCC member to think and act on environmental matters. And that’s because it’s what God would want us to do. He would want us all to understand and solve issues that include the Earth. Because He gave humans the world to care for and do good in. As it says in Micah 6:8, we strive to “do justice” and live out our faith by caring for God’s creation.

    Some of the problems and questions that your Green Chalice committee here at First Christian are tackling right now are: paper use reduction, carbon footprint calculations, food waste solutions, and increasing lighting efficiency. There will be many more eco-friendly decisions to be made, and we want you to be a part of helping our church improve itself environmentally. Interested in joining or listening to a meeting? We meet every 2nd Tuesday each month at 6:30 pm, in the Fellowship hall.
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    Here are a couple things you can do right now, to move FCC further down the path to being the best green church we can.

· Use the QR bulletin scanner located in the narthex instead of a paper bulletin. This will not only save the church paper and money, but also keep more trees alive.

· Place your paper bulletin in the recycle box, so we can prevent it from being thrown away after its use. Recycling keeps loads of useful materials out of landfills!

· Carpool or share a ride with FCC friends to service and other church events. This will lessen both your gas usage and carbon footprint when going places!
 
    And if you’re interested in how you can help or would like to learn more about our Green Chalice Committee, contact me. My email is [email protected]. I’m happy to help and answer any questions you have!
 
Thanks,
-Roy Henderson, Green Chalice Committee chair

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