7 March: Go renewable

Solar power is a clean, reliable, affordable way to generate power. Rooftop or garden solar for your home or parish is a wonderful way to reduce your contribution to climate change and protect creation. Special financing arrangements in your area may make this investment easier. Spend a few minutes investigating what options are available in your region.

If a large solar array isn’t feasible, appliance-specific panels are a very good second option. A solar phone or laptop charger, lantern, or small generator all capture the sun’s energy to power the tools we use in our daily lives.

However you choose to incorporate solar power as an energy choice, you will reduce your dependence on fossil fuels. This is an expression of our faith’s call to love our neighbors by protecting them from climate change.

As Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby has said, “Responding to climate change is an essential part of our responsibility to safeguard God’s creation. Meanwhile, to love our neighbour — particularly, in this case, our neighbour whom we may never meet but who lives daily with the profound threat posed by this moral crisis — is at the core of what it is to follow Jesus Christ.”