Weaving creation care throughout the liturgical year helps to ensure that the fifth mark of mission is embedded in the worshipping life of a congregation, as the Revd Sue Shillam of All Saints in Hemblington explains:
All Saint’s Church is a small round tower church which sits amongst the fields to the east of Norwich. We have always been close to nature and we enjoy special relationships with the farmers who are our neighbours. Indeed generations of farmers now rest in peace in our churchyard.
Our churchyard is a conservation area and acts also as a large garden where passersby rest and enjoy the views and the wildflowers. Our management and care of our outside spaces has contributed to first our bronze Eco Church Award and now our Silver Award.
Last year we created a special service for Creation Sunday and then of course Harvest. This year we decided to try and focus on World Earth Day, Creation Sunday, and Harvest. The challenge in writing these special services was that a lot of the material was similar. To try to solve this problem we reached out to Barbara Bryant at the Diocese who provided some useful information together with some additional information from our Cathedral.
We didn’t use the published theme for World Earth Day, instead we focused on the ‘Wisdom of the Trees’ and used material from the Bible Reading Fellowship Green Reflections. Other material which was useful for ideas came from the Creation Care Prayers Environmental Programme Church of England. It truly was a labour of love to put the services together and ensuring that a number of the congregation played a part in the service.
These services attract a number of people from the rural areas, and we anticipate more involvement from our local school who currently use our churchyard as part of their school studies.
We propose now that this schedule of creation services will feature each year in our calendar of services.
You can download a copy of Sue’s Earth Day service outline here.
Have you started your Eco Church journey yet?
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Watch the message from Bishop Graham here
For any further help, contact barbara.bryant@dioceseofnorwich.org