Christians believe that God made the world with all its beauty and diversity, that it all belongs to Him and during our lives we are stewards of this beautiful planet.
We believe that we should put our trust in God to supply our daily needs and we pray this in the Lord’s Prayer “Give us today our daily bread” which doesn’t just mean physical bread on the table but to supply our needs physically, mentally and spiritually. In return it is up to us to take responsibility for caring for the world.
A member of All Saints Anglican Church in the Algarve, Christina Tenazinha, writes a monthly article in our church newsletter sharing information to raise awareness of ways in which might take more responsibility for our actions with regard to the adverse impact mankind has had on earth in recent years.
Christina writes: 22 April 2021 was Earth Day and I wonder if you know what that means? The first Earth Day was in 1970 and it would be wonderful to say that since then we have all changed our daily actions and that the problems with our environment have now been solved.
Unfortunately, that is far from true.
This year’s theme for Earth Day is ‘Restore the Earth’. Now, for myself as a Christian, I often look in wonder at the world around me and marvel at the many delights this world has to offer us. Luckily, I live in the countryside and at the moment I hear the birds chirping, I see the flowers blossoming, I feel the sun on my skin, and I smell the orange blossoms and many other flowers now in bloom. I am truly blessed to live where I do and I hope that I thank God often enough for all the beauty that I experience every day.
Earth Day was started to try and raise awareness of issues with our environment and has now grown to 1 billion individuals mobilizing to action every Earth Day with more than 190 countries getting involved. When we think about how climate change affects the world what we start to learn about is the number of people living without clean water, without enough food to eat, people being pushed into slave labour work conditions, abuse of human rights, displacement of native people, the list goes on.
So, over the next few weeks maybe you can become more aware. More aware of what nature gives us, more aware of the water we use, more aware of the food we eat, the homes we have, the clothes we wear.
Then consider steps that you might be able to take to make an impact, change from bottled water to tap, refuse a bag, pick some litter up when you see it, buy local, grow your own, buy clothes from a charity shop. There are many small steps we can take but while you are becoming aware of what we have, think about the impact that we are having on our world and maybe start to think what changes you can make that will really help Restore God’s Earth.
For more information about Earth Day go to : https://www.earthday.org/earth-day-2021/
About All Saints Anglican Church Algarve : Almancil
All Saints Anglican Church Algarve is an Anglican Church (part of the Worldwide Anglican Communion) providing contemporary and relevant worship with strong Biblical teaching for the 21st Century.
Our doors are wide open to people from all backgrounds and nationalities who wish to join us on our faith journey of following Jesus Christ.
We are one Church with currently two worship opportunities.
One live and in person at 11am on Sunday Morning the Convent in Lagoa in a safe socialy distanced environment
The other live, interactive and on line, providing a virtual worship service at 10.30am on Sunday Morning
For more information and details on location and service times please contact: :
E: secretary@allsaintsalgarve.church
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/allsaintsalgarve
W: www.allsaintsalgarve.church
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