Keep it simple this year.
By Aaron Cooper and the staff of Lutherans Restoring Creation
As we embark on the Advent season in November, we await not only the birth of the Christ child but also the onset of a new creation.
Jesus’ whole life bore witness to this. His announcement of the arrival of God’s kingdom inaugurated the restoration of all creation. His death served to reconcile all things in heaven and Earth. His resurrection marked the renewal of all things.
So, at Christmas, we celebrate the birth of one whose appearance showed that God so loved the “whole world.”
And it was a simple birth: Mary and Joseph, baby Jesus swaddled, lying in a manger without fanfare or excess. So before you find yourself caught up in another countdown to Christmas when there is less and less time to evaluate your priorities, take time now to think about how you can simplify your Christmas and celebrate the blessed birth in a more Earth-friendly and responsible manner.
Here are suggestions on how you can incorporate a simpler, greener approach to Christmas this year:
Gifts
Instead of each person in your family or gift circle exchanging individual gifts with each other, draw names and let each one give to one person only. Reduce plastic and paper by shopping with reusable bags. Purchase eco-friendly gifts. Buy gently used books, toys and other gifts instead of new ones. Give someone a park pass or an event ticket rather than material items. Offer a service such as childcare or a massage. Give the gift of time: an experience or a trip with your family.
If you are good at making crafts, consider making gifts for your loved ones. Or shop at a local fair-trade store. If you buy traditional gifts, minimize your carbon footprint by purchasing local and energy-efficient gifts that are minimally packaged.
And consider reusable or recycled gift wrap this year. Plan ahead by recycling this year’s paper, bows and ribbon for use next year. Purchase Christmas cards made from recycled paper or send electronic Christmas greetings.
A growing trend of recent years is alternative giving, which many congregations support by holding an alternative giving fair. Alternative gifts in the ELCA include a donation to an ELCA ministry, such as ELCA World Hunger. Visit ELCA Good Gifts for many such options where you can make a donation and even have a card sent to the recipient in his or her honor.
Decorations
Save and reuse decorations from year to year. Make your own decorations. This can become a wonderful family tradition. Use recycled materials or natural materials like pine cones, leaves and vines. Making your own Christmas wreath out of materials you collected is carbon neutral and positively fun!
Lights: Minimize or eliminate lighting decorations. Use LED lights, which use around 90 percent less energy than incandescent Christmas lights. Look for lights that are Energy Star approved. Remember to conserve energy and not to leave lights on all day or overnight.
Trees: Purchase potted trees, so they can be replanted. Or plant a tree that you could use later for many years outside. In some places, one can even rent a living tree. If you need to dispose of a tree, compost it rather than burning it.
Christmas dinner: Eat local, eat organic and eat low on the food chain. Most grocery stores carry a wide selection of organic products. Consider a subscription to a Community Supported Agriculture program as a source for Christmas dinner or as a gift for the year.
Congregational ideas: Have a thoughtful discussion about meaningful ways to celebrate the birth of Christ. Promote Christmas celebrations that are joyous and yet minimize your congregation’s carbon footprint. Since many congregations decorate with planted poinsettias, try to obtain them from a local farm with fair ecological practices. Hold a Bible study on the implications of the meaning of Christmas and how that ties into being good stewards of our time, money and creation.
According to “Green Christmas: How to Have a Joyous, Eco-Friendly Holiday Season” by Jennifer Sander, Peter Sander and Anne Basye, “Every year between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day, Americans generate 25 million extra tons of garbage (about 25 percent more than during the rest of the year) and spend billions of dollars on purchases that may trigger an uptick on Wall Street but leave consumers burdened with more debt.”
What can we do to minimize that disproportionate “holiday effect” on God’s creation and spend money, time and energy in a more responsible manner? A lot! And in so doing, we will be giving the greatest honor to God by celebrating Christmas in ways that resonate deeply with the most precious gift of God’s son.
Aaron Cooper is a freelance writer and member of Edison Park Lutheran Church an ELCA congregation in Chicago.
You might also want to read:
A small seed grows into a movement
Children’s worship at Advent, Christmas or Epiphany
ELCA Lutherans proclaim their commitment to God’s creation
Christ's birth isn't about living green. I think there is a false gospel mixed in here: The primary idol here is "living green". Jesus was not about "living green". Jesus was about forgiveness to sinners.
and one of the things about which we need to be forgiven is not living green. We are called to live in the world as the children of God. We were created in relationship to the creator who formed us, the community as in the creature from which we were formed male and female and community began, and the earth from which we were formed. Don't be dissin' the beautiful gift of God Peter.
Dan,
I'm not dissing God's creation; I'm saying that burdening consciences such that people believe they must "live green" in order to please God and/or "living green" does please God is contrary to the Gospel.
Personally, my suspicion is that a lot of this is adiaphoron. Leaving that suspicion aside for the moment, though, and assuming that God's Law is indeed 'live green', let's see where that takes us. If it's God's Law that we live green, there are a few things we need to keep in mind, starting with Lex semper accusat, or "The Law always accuses". This is not something that will bring peace of mind, but instead is something that burdens our consciences, shows us how we are not measuring up. We can't be green enough. What further burdens consciences is implying that we can make things right with God if only we "live green"... that doing any of the things suggested about are "Christian", even God-pleasing or will even prevent death.
The Christian message we have is that there is exactly one God-pleasing thing out there: Jesus Christ. He is so God-pleasing that God raised Jesus from the dead even after we killed Him. What's crazy is that God re-cycles the resurrection so that we, who killed Jesus, have a share of it. There is nothing more that needs to be done. God has given us mercy where we've deserved wrath. That mercy transforms our hearts and brings us new life, reconciled to God. Where we go from there is up to us, which is okay, because we've been made right with God. For some it is undoubtably focusing on protecting, restoring and redeeming that part of creation we call our environment. But not for all. Each person has their own vocation to live out.
While being "green" is a fine idea ecologically-speaking, I agree with Peter's observations above. It is abysmally mind-numbing how many messages tauted and shouted in the Church today are called the "Gospel message," effectively replacing THE normative proclamation of the Church: forgiveness of sin by the free grace of God for the sake of Jesus Christ. Little wonder that many today will never know a real need for God in their lives and the fullness of the salvation He brings, but simply a humanistic need to be "greener," more inclusive, more sensitive to differences, etc. No doubt, there would even be those for whom the Cross itself represents little more than an ecological waste of wood!
Living green and caring for God's gift of creation is a gift, not a law. One of the ways I live out my love of God is caring for this gift of creation. Seeing it as a law is sort of like saying I have to love my wife and we all know what kind of trouble we get into when we go down that rabbit hole.
Dan,
It's not a gift if you can say "one of the things about which we need to be forgiven is not living green." That's a law, no matter how politely phrased.
One of the ways I live out my love for wife is to pick up after myself. It is not a law, but there are consequences.
If you are doing it to avoid the consequences, you're not doing it out of love. You're doing it to avoid the punishment. That's law. Doing it out of love is doing it regardless of the consequences for the sheer reason that you want to.
Perhaps you missed my point. I do pick up after myself at home out of love for my wife (which is not to say that is all I do out of love for my wife but is simply a small example). I do pick up after myself in the world out of love for the creator (which is not to say that is all I do out of love for God but is simply a small example). I am also aware that do not do so also carries consiquences and in this world and in these conversations a little levity is not a bad thing.