Description provided by the Zygon Center for Religion and Science:
On December 5-6, 2019 ZCRS supported the Chicago Symposium on Ecologically Informed Theological Education that was hosted by LSTC and sponsored by the Lutheran School of Theology at Chicago (LSTC) and McCormick Theological Seminary through a grant from the Henry Luce Foundation administered by the Interfaith Center for Sustainable Development, Methodist Theological School in Ohio (MTSO), and the Green Seminary Initiative.
The conference opened with a noon field trip to the Southeast Environmental Taskforce for a “Toxic to Treasures Tour” of Chicago’s southeast corner to look at the impacts that heavy (polluting) industries are having upon the residents of Chicago’s Calumet River Industrial Corridor and what a vision to replace these with “green” industries similar to those recently developed in areas immediately to the west of the most-impacted areas.
The rest of the afternoon was spent screening and discussing the documentary film, “Flint: The Poisoning of an American City”. This particularly hit home for several participants who had family members who had lived in Flint. Our “take-away” from this and the tour was that brownfields and heavy industry can be replaced but that it takes a lot of focus on the political and financial parts of the process to ensure that green development happens and that residents do not lose their voice in the process; individual and collective voices that can share their memories of what has gone before and the vision of what is possible in each particular location.
The evening keynote address of “By Any Greens Necessary: The Intersection of Faith, Food and Ecology as Agents of Transformational Change and Community Renewal” was given by Monica Brown Moss of Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago. Her talk was an inspirational review of how her congregation was acting as an agent for changing their neighborhood’s interaction with food to promote greater access for healthier eating and lifestyles in its community, starting with, but not limited to gathering the community around the dinner table at the church.
The next morning, we gathered to hear how MTSO and Drew Theological School “green” their campuses; having land allows for on-site solar power generation and farming to provide for a school’s dining hall. But, as Monica Brown Moss’s talk the previous evening had shown, there are ways for institutions to connect with local farmers and land owners to do the same thing.
The afternoon was filled with connecting Chicago area seminaries with local community organizations involved in environmental justice activities and how to partner with one another before a closing worship led by Father Vrame from Hellenic College Holy Cross with a sermon by President Ortega-Aponte from Meadville-Lombard Theological School.