Environmental Ministry and Creation Justice at First Congregational Church in Guilford
In April, 2021, First Congregational Church of Guilford, CT received the good news from
Rev. Dr. Brooks Berndt, Minister of Environmental Justice of the United Church of Christ (UCC)
in Cleveland, Ohio, that our application to become a UCC-designated Creation Justice Church
was approved. We were the first UCC church in Connecticut to be granted this designation, but
we joined many UCC congregations across the country that were already Creation Justice
churches. Creation Justice churches go through a series of steps from forming a Green Team, in
our church called the Environmental Ministry Team (EMT, formed 5 years ago), to doing things
to reduce our carbon footprint and address climate change. Guided by the EMT, our church
installed a solar array on our education building, reduced the use of paper, plastic and
Styrofoam, and reduced some of the church lawn by creating a composter and organic garden,
which produces 200 pounds of produce each summer which we donate to three different food
banks. We joined a larger network of interfaith congregations, Interreligious Eco-Justice
Network (IREJN), to advocate for Creation care, and our church received the Green House of
Worship Level 3 designation by IREJN. Our church is now represented on the SNEUCC
Environmental Ministry Team and on the IREJN Board of Directors.
However, to apply for the designation as a UCC Creation Justice church,
we needed to engage in critical thinking about the socio-economic dimensions of
environmental degradation, such as race, class, and global inequality. We were helped in this
endeavor by offering a book study, attended by 25 members of our church, of Rev. Dr. Jim
Antal’s book, Climate Church, Climate World and by having Rev. Dr. Antal preach an
enlightening sermon at our church. We learned from him that climate change exacerbates all
sorts of injustice which results in racism, poverty, inequality, deadly viruses, refugees, and war.
So, our defense of Creation is actually a campaign for justice.
Using the new SNEUCC Green Congregation Challenge, our EMT is leading the church to
work on Level 4 with goals to make Creation care and justice integral to our ongoing theology
and worship, to learn more about the social and justice impacts of environmental degradation,
especially in low-income communities in CT and New England, to expand education to our
community about climate change, and to engage in more legislative advocacy for Creation care
and justice at our Capitol in Hartford. Our EMT also helps other UCC churches to form their
Green Teams and to begin environmental advocacy.
Creation justice signals the truth of our interconnectedness with all people and all of
Nature, now and in generations to come, and with the movement toward right relationships
among all God’s Creation. Creation justice indicates our commitment to not only heal, tend and
restore God’s Creation, but to ensure the protection of people from exploitation as well as
ensure provisions for the remediation of the damage that has been done to them. Toward
these ends, EMT members marched in Washington, DC in the April, 2017 Peoples Climate
March and some will march on June 18, again in Washington, DC, in the Poor Peoples Campaign
Moral March, led by Rev. Dr. William Barber and Rev. Dr. Liz Theoharis.
A new project our EMT has organized is to ring our church bells on the 11th day of every
month, as do many UCC churches throughout New England, to sound the alarm about the 11th
hour of climate change’s threat. We began on May 11 with a short service which included the
land acknowledgment of Native people on whose historic land our church stands, an opening
prayer, a solo of “For the Beauty of the Earth”, a reading of the poem “Trusting the Spiral” from
Joanna Macy’s and Chris Johnstone’s book Active Hope, and sharing information about the
Environmental Voter Project and the Creation Care Voter Pledge. We had a table set up outside
beside our UCC Creation Justice Church banner, near the front steps of the church, and on the
table we had copies of the Creation Care Voter Pledge that people could sign as well as
information about the importance of voting in all sorts of elections for candidates who are
advocates for Creation care and justice. Then we rang the bells 11 times at 11:11 AM and
closed by reading in unison “A Hopi Elder Speaks”. Some people brought their own bells to ring
and to attract passers-by to our table. We encouraged them to sign the Creation Care Voter
Pledge and to find out if candidates for public office are Creation care supporters before they
vote.
It is our hope that other houses of worship around our Guilford Green will join us in the
coming months to ring their bells on the 11th day of July at 11:11AM, and each month
thereafter, because we believe all religious people need to bring their faith to the public square
to raise awareness about climate change and the disproportionate effects it has on low-income
people and people of color…who do the least to cause the climate change in our state, our
country and around the world. For those of us on our EMT and others, who constantly write
letters and make calls to our state and U.S. Legislators and bring our faith to the public square,
we view environmental advocacy as a daily spiritual discipline alongside prayer. Eric Fine of the
Yale Program on Climate Communications reminds us that 80% of people in the U.S. say climate
change is happening. So if we don’t talk about the facts of climate change with our friends and
with our Legislators, to counteract the misinformation and misperceptions “out there” about
climate change, we reinforce what Mr. Fine calls the “climate spiral of silence”. And Ph.D
climate scientist, Texas Tech University Professor and Evangelical Christian author Katharine
Hayhoe says, “The single most important thing that anyone can do to bring people together to
address climate change is to talk about it.” So ring those bells!!
Rev. Nancy Leckerling
Co-Chair, Environmental Ministry Team
First Congregational Church
122 Broad Street
Guilford, CT 06437
