We asked Sarah Wildeman, Internship Coordinator at A Rocha’s Brooksdale Environmental Centre to report on her recent trip to Alberta. Here’s what she had to say:

I recently spent a very full week near and in Edmonton, Alberta to meet with a number of pastors, university students and faculty, A Rocha donors and friends. I also led an 8-hour seminar with 35 students from Prairie Bible Institute on creation care. The trip was overwhelmingly encouraging, as I glimpsed how God is stirring in His people in Alberta around the topic of environmental stewardship.

A major highlight from my trip included meeting with a pastor in Red Deer who attended the Regent / A Rocha pastor’s conference last spring. He came away so inspired that he led an 8-week series on creation care, titled “Every Living Thing” in his mega-church. The church is continuing to explore ways of integrating this vision into their mission as a congregation, such as starting a community garden and offering more workshops to help people make real change in their lives.

I also met with the pastor of a small Anglican church in Edmonton that has committed to invest the proceeds from the cell tower on their property in Canadian missions. They were looking for a ministry that was serving in creation care and found us online – now they have partnered with us as generous donors! They too were excited to explore ways that they could encourage their congregation to engage in issues of caring for God’s good earth. (I made sure to point them to our Good Seed Sunday resources!)

The seminar I led was also extremely encouraging. More than half of the students in the course came from industrial farming or industry based backgrounds and came feeling defensive before we even began. It was powerful to watch them really open up to the topic as we explored ways that God calls us to care for all creation.

One student summed up nicely what other students also communicated at the end of the day:

“Thank you so much for this! I have only ever heard about environmental issues from a polarized, antagonizing secular point of view before — it has been so disarming and impactful to look at this topic from a Christian perspective. I feel challenged to think through how caring for the environment is part of my faith – this is a game changer!”