As temperatures continue to dip down and winter approaches, the Nanaimo Green Faith Circle may stop conducting their meetings in outdoor places.
Julia Roberts, founder of the circle, says that at their most recent meeting on October 30th, the wind was a bit chilly.
“It would be good as the actual weather cools off to something indoors. The regulations for indoor worship services are— actually there are none— but people are still uncomfortable. So, I’m not sure. We’re gonna have to think this through— what we’re gonna do next.”
Green Faith is an organization that shares multi-faith spiritual practices with environmental-protection ideology.
Roberts states that in her experience with other groups she was a part of— such as a group in Nelson,— there was a rotating cast of buildings that worship could be conducted in.
“That worked well because they were ‘our buildings,’ if I can put it that way. We didn’t have to book them or rent them or anything else, but as at the moment I’m finding people are a bit nervous about doing indoors stuff, and [on Saturday] it was cold in the wind,” Roberts laughed then continued. “So I’m not sure whether we’ll be doing a lot more outdoor stuff until we head for spring.”
Around 40 people of various religious faiths gathered at the pavilion in Maffeo Sutton park Saturday. Robert says there was a moment of silence and prayers sent, which ‘brings another dimension’ to coping with the climate crisis.
“The reason we did this on Saturday was because on Sunday the UN climate change conference started in Glasgow and it goes on till November 12th. This was about sending prayers and good energy to Glasgow. The issues that the leaders meeting there have to deal with are really difficult and I think a spiritual approach to this is…” Roberts trailed off. “Don’t get into a ‘us and them’ mindset. Don’t make enemies of people but rather, be open hearted, compassionate, listen to one another, and work to find creative solutions. I think a faith perspective helps with all that.”
More information about the Nanaimo Green Faith Circle is available here.
