Solar Clutter Sale

Thank you to everyone who donated or spent this morning. Exclaimers are delighted to announce that we raised £155 at today's Clutter Sale. This will be split between New Town Primary School in our parish and New Christ Church Primary School which is attended by James and Matthew. If anyone would like to send in any more money to help raise funds for the schools' solar panels, please go to www.solarschools.org.uk and find the school you would like to donate to. Or speak to Hugh or myself about contributing to a church donation.

We had a fantastic spread of donations and I know Mark is very happy with the coffee maker he brought back and the boys have been having great fun with the remote control helicopter! All the non electrical goods that were not sold are now on their way to the Communicare shop. Helen is trying to find a charity shop that will take the electrical goods for us.

God's World: Why and How to Become an EcoCongregation

With apologies for the very long delay in writing this up; the EcoCongregations event on 17th November was a fantastic evening with a real buzz of enthusiasm for greening our churches among the 80+ attendees. Thank you very much to everyone who came along and/or helped to make it happen!
Bishop Andrew gave a fascinating and moving talk about his experiences in Ethiopia; I tried to squeeze in reference to as many different environmental resources for churches as possible in a rather short space of time; and there followed really useful reports from the Society of Friends, All Saints Wokingham and Earley St Nicholas on their churches' experiences of greening their worship, practice and outreach.
Afterwards we enjoyed some seriously delicious food from Tutu's Ethiopian Table along with fair trade wine.
There were stalls to browse from several other churches including St Barnabas, Emmer Green displaying their beautiful new sensory garden; Park URC with information on pv panels and biomass boilers; St Paul's URC Bracknell; St Mary and St John Finchampstead; and St James Pangbourne/ Pangbourne and Whitchurch Sustainability Group; as well as A Rocha, CEL and Earthing Faith etc. I was especially pleased that Reading Friends of the Earth were able to come along and Transition Town Reading since it is so important for churches to be part of their wider community's response to the environmental crises. Greyfriars bookshop kindly provided a stall of appropriate books and I know John Madeley sold a good number of copies of his Let Live (a bike ride, climate change and the CIA)!