'Making lifestyle changes throws us many challenges.' Photo: Isravel Raj / Unsplash.
‘Many of us, even committed “greens”, are not doing as much as we would like.’
Colour coordinated: Zee-Zee Heine prepares for greening our Meeting
What would achieving ‘zero carbon’ in our Area Meeting look like? Recently, about twenty-five Friends in Sheffield and Balby Area Meeting gathered to explore this. The day was a great success and people went away with ideas, enthusiasm and energy.
The inspiration for the event came from the ‘Visioning a world without weapons’ workshops that were common when I was a Young Friend. But responding to climate change is more technical and requires more personal change (in the 1980s no one had ballistic missiles in their back garden, whereas we are all involved in producing climate change). Making lifestyle changes throws us many challenges. Many of us, even committed ‘greens’, are not doing as much as we would like. To overcome this, we started with an exercise looking at overcoming blocks.
The group ranged from people not sure exactly what ‘zero carbon’ means, or what it has to do with climate change, to others who were real experts in one area or another. To bring everyone up to speed (and to keep the focus of the day on what we can do rather than what the government and others could be doing), we used the Ethical Property Company as a case study and then spent the rest of the morning sharing ideas.
In the afternoon we considered what it would look like to achieve zero carbon, then to follow up participants’ particular interests we divided into four groups.
One group was on travel; a second on food, looking at whether our Quaker Meetings should go vegan and how you would achieve that; a third group was looking at Sheffield Central Meeting specifically; and the last group did some ‘back-casting’ – that is, considering the last step before achieving the vision, the second to last, and so on.
Another theme that ran throughout the day was how we can get better at telling people (such as other building users) about what we are already doing.
We ended the day with some worship sharing. Participants said: ‘This was a day which provided inspiration, and most importantly (in the current climate) hope’; ‘I found our time together timely and helpful, especially our group visioning activity: what could our Meeting house be like in twenty years’ time and how could we make this “if” a reality?’; ‘I left feeling hopeful that at our next Meeting for Church Affairs we will discern together a positive, proactive way forward in response to the climate emergency’; ‘Being fairly well-versed in climate change I confess I came along wondering if I would learn anything new. As it turned out, it’s been one of the most enjoyable and productive days I’ve spent on these topics. I have come away, above all, more positive and hopeful – and this is exactly what I needed.’
If you would like Zee-Zee to facilitate a similar day for your Meeting, you can contact her via the Friend.
