Janet Twomey, Chair of Pastoral Support Group in Carrigaline Parish sent ECI this update:
The Parish of Our Lady and St. John in Carrigaline has started the journey to become an Eco-Congregation Parish and has received an Awareness Award Certificate from Eco-Congregation Ireland. A number of parishioners attended a six-week course in Carrigaline Parish Centre, facilitated by Frank Dorr and Eileen Lynch called ‘The World as Joyful Mystery’. The course explored the wonder of the world, our relationship with all of creation, what we as a human race are doing to damage the very fragile earth and how we can work together to tackle some of the local and global issues relating to climate change that are impacting all communities.
The topic of Caring for Creation now features as an agenda item at our monthly Pastoral Support Group meeting, of which there are approximately fifteen members. A number of group members met in the local hotel one Saturday morning during November last and completed the Environmental Check Up for Your Church document which was provided to us by Eco-Congregation Ireland. It is was an interesting and affirming exercise to see how we are already playing our part, but it was also a wake-up call for us to do SO much more!
We have a number of actions we are now working on for 2019. The first action is to look at how to make coffee morning fundraising events (of which there are many in the parish) more eco-friendly – encouraging the use of crockery instead of paper cups, plates and spoons, purchasing fairtrade tea and coffee and using environmentally-friendly washing up liquid.
