Eco Church
Offenham Church is proud to have been awarded the A Rocha Eco Church Silver award.
Congratulations to everyone who worked so hard to achieve this. We have some way to go before we achieve Gold status, but we can do it!
To find out more about Eco Church please go to the website by clicking here
Congratulations to everyone who worked so hard to achieve this. We have some way to go before we achieve Gold status, but we can do it!
To find out more about Eco Church please go to the website by clicking here
Eco Church is a scheme run by A Rocha UK equipping churches to care for God’s creation through their worship, buildings, land, Community and lifestyles.
To achieve awards we need to attain certain standards in five areas. Worship & Teaching, Management of Buildings, Management of Church Land, Community & Global Engagement and Lifestyle.
What have we done to achieve Silver status?
To achieve awards we need to attain certain standards in five areas. Worship & Teaching, Management of Buildings, Management of Church Land, Community & Global Engagement and Lifestyle.
What have we done to achieve Silver status?
- Our Sermons and Hymns celebrate God’s creation and we regularly advocate for environmental issues.
- We have set targets for reducing our carbon emissions and use a green electricity tariff. We use low energy bulbs and insulate where possible.
- We manage our land to encourage wildlife and monitor this regularly. Our planting includes plants and flowers to attract bees and other pollinators. Recycling facilities are available inside and outside the church.
- We are a fairtrade church and use Fairtrade tea and coffee after our services. Our toilet is twinned with a latrine in Zimbabwe.
- We encourage our community to be more environmentally sustainable by sharing lifestyle tips via newsletters and social media.
How you can help this Christmas
As you will be aware, St Mary & St Milburgh Church currently hold a Silver Eco Church Award and we are currently solidifying the work we have already done and working towards the Gold award, which will be a huge achievement. One of the areas we want to improve on is our plastic use and introduction of plastic into the churchyard. With Christmas approaching, you can help by thinking carefully about what floral arrangements you place on the graves of loved ones. Think about how you make them without oasis/foam or plastic rings? There are rattan wreath bases, moss around a metal ring, chicken wire, all of which make fantastic plastic free alternatives. Every action we take to avoid plastic use makes a positive impact.
Fairtrade
In January 2025 St Mary & St Milburgh Church became a Fairtrade Church. Thank you to Debbie for making sure we are doing our bit to make a difference.
To find out more about the Fiartrade Foundation and how we achieved our Fairtrade status please click here
To find out more about the Fiartrade Foundation and how we achieved our Fairtrade status please click here