We hope you enjoy this guest article by Rev. Bonnie Fackre-Cochise of Christ the Healer UCC about Climate Café Kid’s Kitchen.
Climate Café is both a vision and an event. Provided by creative chefs as well as generous gifts of organic produce from local growers, it offers a setting which invites the community to share “equitable edibles” in a “low carbon footprint” meal in the context of a “gift economy.”
Volunteers for the Climate Café plant, harvest, and prepare a meal that tantalizes the taste buds and satisfies the belly. “Focalizers” generate a program that inspires the mind. Donors and diners provide the funds for the next meal on a pay-it-forward basis, so that all are welcome to sit at the table together. No one is left out because of lack of income!
On a planet that is facing the stress and strain of climate change, Climate Café offers a model for new way to eat and—in fact—for a new way to live. We deliver a delicious meal in an inviting space—where people can discover how simply by changing the way we eat can help address the world-wide environmental crisis that increasingly impacts our everyday lives.
Climate Café has already held “pop-ups” in various church settings in the greater metropolitan area. Farmers such as Acres of Abundant Grace in Canby and Eloheh Indigenous Creation Justice Center in Yamhill have supported the project, not only with hefty donations of healthy produce but also with their hard-won wisdom about regenerative land use and earth-friendly gardening.
We are currently looking for ways to empower youngsters with healthy solutions to climate-related problems. We believe that it is possible to bring about healing for the earth and all its inhabitants, and we are especially concerned about the missing younger generations from our communities who are inheriting a damaged environment.
To jumpstart this effort, we are reaching out to children and youth and their mentors—eager to address climate change issues, courageously and courageously. Certainly this entails experimentation and learning: What is regenerative farming? What is a gift economy? How can I help?
Perhaps more importantly, however, are the questions of faith that come to the fore: Where does our hope come from? How is God calling us, in our humanity, to cherish the earth and all its people? Recognizing that those who will come and eat with us will be coming from many different faith orientations OR who might be unfamiliar truth-seekers from whom we too can learn, how will we reach out in this common quest?
In hopes of developing a true children’s component for Climate Café—one that respects all viewpoints, I am happy to help facilitate this kind of conversation and interaction. Email me for more information and questions.
Sincerely in Christ,
Bonnie Fackre-Cochise