Environmental sustainability to be focus of next Diocesan Convention
by the Right Reverend Thomas Clark Ely, Bishop of Vermont
Mountain Echo, May 2008

Dear people of Vermont:

In my January Mountain Echo column I spoke about entering the New Year with hope and about four matters I believed would be an important part of 2008 for me and for us as a diocese. In my last two columns I have written about two of those matters: the welcoming of the Reverend Angela Emerson as our new Minister for Stewardship Development and the upcoming Lambeth Conference, scheduled for July 16 to August 3, 2008. In this column I turn my attention to yet another of those topics – the conclusion of our 175th diocesan anniversary celebration and our upcoming Diocesan Convention.

Diocesan Convention 2008 is scheduled for November 7–8, and will be held at Trinity Church, Rutland, where Bishop John Henry Hopkins presided over his first convention as Bishop of the Diocese of Vermont. The theme, around which we will gather this November—and at the Ministry Fairs leading up to Convention—is environmental sustainability. This theme was chosen in order to build upon our commitment to a sustainable future for our planet and all people expressed in our support of the United Nations Millennium Development Goals. The connection between ending global poverty and environmental sustainability runs deep. The seventh of the eight Millennium Development Goals is “Ensure environmental sustainability.”

In the 2003 Pastoral Letter on the Environment issued by the bishops of Province One, that connection between poverty and the environment was highlighted with these words: The poor, the marginalized, and the least powerful of our human neighbors are those who suffer most from illness and pollution caused by environmental degradation. Generators, incinerators, and waste disposal facilities are concentrated in impoverished neighborhoods; children in our inner cities suffer alarming rates of asthma; overemphasis on the use of private vehicles deprives the poor of transportation. Exploitation of the poor is closely linked to exploitation of the earth, and our quest for social justice and economic sustainability must rest on a foundation of ecological stability. As baptized Christians, we are clearly called to care for creation, loving our neighbors as ourselves. Through prayer and action to protect the earth, we acknowledge the ongoing redemption of all creation in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:19a), and we minister to Christ himself, who particularly identifies with the outcast and suffering (Matthew 25:35-36).

A strong program committee, under the leadership of the Reverend Anita Schell Lambert from Saint Peter’s, Bennington, is hard at work in preparation for the 2008 Ministry Fairs and the Convention itself. Among other things, they are exploring tangible means of giving expression to the many ways we, as individuals and as faith communities, can take active roles in addressing our environmental commitments. They hope to shine a light on some of the best practices in which people of faith here in Vermont and beyond are already engaged. They hope to challenge all of us to be better stewards, advocates and “good neighbors” for the present and future well-being of the earth.

In celebrating the last 175 years of ministry, we acknowledge the past and present contributions that the people and congregations of the Episcopal Diocese of Vermont have made throughout the years and the deep faithfulness that has been a hallmark of our life as a diocese. Our celebration so far has included, among other things, the composition of a wonderful anniversary hymn, the mounting of handsome parish shields in the foyer of the Cathedral, a new historical narrative about the journey of our diocese toward the election of its first bishop, the Rock Point School calendar project highlighting the biographies of our bishops, the use of Bishop Hopkins’s crozier during my visitations to congregations, an inspiring and engaging visit from our new Presiding Bishop, and a memorable celebration of our diocese at Washington National Cathedral on Vermont Day.

The next 175 years of ministry will be filled with challenges and opportunities. Perhaps none of them is more important than our commitment to environmental stewardship. There is hope for our world and its future. We are part of that hope and are called as part of our baptismal living to respect the dignity of all God has created, and to full participation in God’s mission to restore all people and all creation to unity with God and each other in Christ.

Speaking to the despair that many often feel in the face of the tremendous environmental challenges before us, the 2003 New England Bishops’ Pastoral Letter on the Environment issued this faith reminder: Lest we experience despair, lest we feel the hopeless conviction that it is too late to change anything, too late to turn this around, we must root ourselves in the deepest convictions of our faith. We put our trust in a God who loves every inch of creation and whose covenant with Creation can never be broken (“I will . . . remember the everlasting covenant between God and every living creature of all flesh that is on the earth.” Genesis 9:16). We share in Christ’s crucifixion, letting ourselves feel and mourn the wounds of Creation. We share in Christ’s resurrection, bearing witness to the Christ who bursts out of the tomb, who proclaims that life, not death, has the last word, and who gives us power to roll away the stone. We receive the Holy Spirit, source of all truth, who sends forth faithful stewards of God’s creation. We nourish ourselves at the Eucharistic table, where Christ gives himself to us in the natural elements of bread and wine, and restores our connections not only with God and one another, but also with the whole web of creation.

That same pastoral letter ended with a statement of commitment by the bishops, which we encouraged Episcopalians throughout New England to embrace. I end my column this month by recommitting myself to those actions and by inviting you to do the same as we head to Convention 2008 and the next 175 years of ministry as the Episcopal Diocese of Vermont.

As brothers and sisters in Christ, we commit ourselves and we urge every Episcopalian in every parish and diocese throughout the Province of New England:
• To act together to honor the goodness and sacredness of God’s creation;
• To acknowledge the urgency of the planetary crisis in which we now find ourselves;
• To pray and take action to restore a right relationship between humankind and creation;
• To lift up prayers in personal and public worship for environmental justice, human rights, and sustainable development;
• To repent of greed and waste, and to seek simplicity of life;
• To commit ourselves to energy conservation and the use of clean, renewable sources of energy;
• To reduce, reuse, and recycle, and as far as possible to buy products from recycled materials;
• To realize that, through participation in community, public policy, and business decision-making, we have corporate as well as individual opportunities to practice environmental stewardship and justice;
• To seek to understand and uproot the political, social, and economic causes of environmental abuse.

Faithfully,
+Thomas

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