St Peter’s Anglican Church in Gonville Whanganui are creating space in their front garden for a whole lot of connecting and growing. St Peter’s Garden is more than just a garden – it’s a space where the community can connect, make friends, grow veges… and play chess!

Captain Simon Montgomery, a member of Salves and corps officer at Whanganui Salvation Army, leads a group of people who are passionate about caring for God’s creation and helping to sustain the environment around them. As a corps (church) they’ve decided to join the A Rocha Eco Church NZ project.

At All Saints Hataitai, we want to play our part and make meaningful and environmentally sustainable choices when it comes to the products we use and companies we support. We’re excited to let you know some of the steps we’ve taken recently, to be better stewards. Clergy, staff and ministry leaders have been working together to make exciting changes across our church – and we would love to share these with you.

Chartwell Cooperating Church is a seasoned traveller on the sustainability journey and as shown from the excerpts below - already has so many stories to share with the Eco Church whānau. Read on to find out more and be inspired to start a creation care initiative at your church!

A long awaited evening, postponed due to COVID, Tawa Anglican Church finally had the opportunity to host Liam and Hannah from The Rubbish Trip in Nov 2022. Around 40-50 people (both from the church and from the wider community) attended to hear about a huge variety of methods for living without a rubbish bin. An inspiring evening from the dynamic duo who walk-the-talk on their zero waste journey.

Hannah Blumhardt and Liam Prince of The Rubbish Trip presented a talk on how to reduce waste during the Christmas season at Ngaio Union Church recently. Topics discussed included gift giving and gift wrapping, Christmas dinner and table settings, decorations and travel. Read on to explore the tips…

As part of the Simplify series at Massey Community Church, members in our Sustainability Group took turns to produce a video about an aspect of their own sustainability journey. There are videos on groceries, transport, clothes shopping, making things at home, being sustainable on a budget, and more.

Late in 2020 All Saints Anglican Church in Ponsonby formed an eco-committee and went through the Eco Church self-assessment worksheet to ascertain areas to begin working on. A number of areas were identified through the worksheet, with the establishment of a community garden being determined as the most important. We liked the idea of a community garden because the church had available land, it is a very visible project and one of our church members has the expertise to make it happen.

St Michael’s Anglican Church in Kelburn joined the Eco Church whānau in Dec 2021. It was not till March 2022 that they officially launched Eco Church at one of their services. Read on to find out some highlights from their Eco Church launch service which included presentations from their local community conservation group, student advocacy action for free fares, an eco quiz and a low-waste morning tea!

At Pauatahanui Anglican parish, one of our four core values is legacy. For many years prior to the launch of Eco Church, a group called God’s Earth Our Home operated within the parish, fostering a deep spiritual sense of ecological responsibility within parishioners and nurturing environmental action. This provided a natural launching pad for the parish to join the Eco Church movement at the start of 2021.

How to get children engaged in sustainability? Baking! Our Kids' Church have been learning about the wonder of Creation, how it's struggling, and how we can participate in God's healing work. When asked how we could reduce our waste at Kids' Church, the children had the fantastic idea of doing some home baking to replace the plastic packets of biscuits they consume each week for morning tea.

In November 2019, ADJust - Diocese of Auckland Young Anglicans for Social Justice, put out to churches in the Auckland Anglican Diocese a "Green Up and Give Challenge". St John’s Anglican Royal Oak took up this challenge and set up a Pātaka Kai (community pantry) and community garden which is now contributing greens to their monthly community meals. Cathy Bi-Riley, the Sustainability Fieldworker from the Anglican Diocese of Auckland visited the church and talked to Sarah Pidgeon from the gardening team who shared with us their small beginnings and future hopes!