St. Peter's Anglican Church in Kaikōura are volunteering with and financially supporting the work of Kaikōura Ocean Research Institute (KORI). For six weeks (early June-mid-July, 2021), some parishioners are also helping with the Great Kaikōura Whale Count. Volunteers are stationed on a hill on the peninsula to spot whales passing by, especially humpbacks on their northern migration. The hope is that, over time, we'll get a baseline of data regarding movements and behaviour of the migrating humpbacks that can inform future conservation decisions.

The Anglican Diocese of Auckland, a denominational partner of Eco Church NZ, has an ongoing commitment to reduce their carbon footprint and care for creation. As part of this commitment, the diocesan staff organised a half-day planting working bee on 12 May at Matuku Link. Fifteen diocesan staff from Neligan House attended the event. They were joined by clergy from Henderson-Swanson Parish.

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!

ARANZ trustee, Stephen Pattemore was invited to speak at Shore Grace church on Sunday 28 March 2021 to celebrate their joining the journey of becoming an Eco Church. On the Sunday we joined them, they were running one of their informal Café services entitled a ‘Neighbours Day Café’ – community plant swap.

As you go past the unassuming church of St Matthew’s Anglican Church in Titahi Bay, you might notice the neat garden beds that line one side of the walkway to the church. Walking a bit further to the side of the hall, you will find some 20 feijoa trees. This is the Titahi Bay Community Garden @ St Matthew’s (TBCG@SM), a community garden run by the Titahi Bay community hosted at St Matthew’s grounds.

In January this year, members of the St. Barnabas Youth Group exercised their faith and kaitiakitanga as they helped eradicate wilding pines. The camp took place at Glenroy Lodge near Hororata last weekend, with a Caring for Creation theme. The young people rolled up their sleeves and got involved in removing wilding pines from an area near Porters Ski Field entrance.

We all know the frustration of not being able to fix something that breaks. Why not let people share their fix-it knowledge and expertise, and run a Repair Café?

In October last year, The Village Presbyterian Church in Ōtautahi-Christchurch decided to tandem up a Repair Café event with our usual monthly Community Market Day. The idea was to have volunteers on hand to help fix broken items that members of the public brought along, thereby stopping stuff going to landfill.

When it was decided that we were not holding a church fair this year, we saw an opportunity to do something different – a Sustainability Fair! We imagined the church hall full of stalls that offered advice and connections, rather than jams, books, and cakes. And we set out to make it happen.

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". The idea of the challenge was for churches to explore starting a community garden, starting a compost, or starting a Pātaka Kai over the season of advent. Below are a few stories from the Green Up and Give Challenge, courtesy of ADJust.

We at the Tribe Church are at the beginning of our journey exploring what it means to be stewards of creation. The journey started when our bible study group went through Tearfund's The Good Lives Project. This study really opened our eyes to seeing how our everyday actions can be an expression of our faith. It inspired us to see what changes we can make at church so we can have a lighter impact on the earth.

In 2019, our church, Massey Community Church in West Auckland, ran a four week series entitled ‘Creation Care’. For the first time in my long experience of church, I encountered in-depth teaching on the biblical mandate we have as followers of Jesus to care for creation – the earth as well as its people. 

At Grace, 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 to become better stewards over the past year. We’ve been working closely with the leadership team and over the past few months, we’ve made some really exciting changes across our church – and we would love to share these with you.