Earth Day 2017 Resources

UUMFE

A Special Sermon for Your 2017 Earth Sunday Service

A huge thank you to long-time UU Ministry for Earth board member Cindy Davidson for crafting a strong sermon on climate change to share with UUs during this challenging Earth Day season and beyond. “Truth Telling and Movement Building in the Climate Crisis” builds on the themes that UUMFE articulated during a strategic planning process last fall. In brief, these themes were:

  • Strategy: Stark truth-telling with humility
  • Focus Areas: Adaptation and disaster preparedness
  • Tactics:
    • Actively fostering community building
    • Promoting leading edge policy and implementations
    • Voicing faith grounding, including acceptance of the predictions/predicament and grief

The numerous “telling the truth about climate change” sections of the sermon provide easy-to-understand examples and explanations plus concrete calls to action. We hope you are both enlightened and challenged by the content and acquire new tools for working collaboratively to meet the challenging and difficult times ahead.

Download the sermon:

  • As a PDF (for easy reading)
  • As a Word doc (allows you to add other worship elements and/or resize as a pulpit copy)

Cindy is currently serving as the ministerial intern at Community UU Congregation of White Plains, NY, while she completes her Master of Divinity degree at the Meadville-Lombard Theological School. Before relocating to Westchester County, she had been an active lay leader of First Parish in Lexington, MA, for fifteen years, including successfully guiding her congregation to Green Sanctuary accreditation. In addition to serving on the UUMFE board, she is also a GreenFaith Fellow and continues to follow her passion for environmental and climate justice.

Three women march and hold a banner that says "the next one won't be Biblical"
Cindy (far left) and friends march in the 2014 People’s Climate March. Photo by Peter Bowden.

Order of Service Covers

For 2017, we offer five Order of Service cover designs, downloadable PDFs in both letter and legal size. The image in the first one listed relates to Cindy’s sermon; the second one is an Earth Day Celebration; and the other three covers feature inspiring natural scenes.

An Order of Service insert (PDF) with information about UUMFE and environmental justice (print two-sided and cut in half) may also be used as a handout at your program table, or use UUMFE’s brochure (PDF).

Honor a Congregational Eco-Hero

Each year, UUMFE invites congregations to honor an Eco-Hero with a special certificate during an Earth Sunday service or other occasion. Your Eco-Hero is that dedicated, hard-working person who has made a significant contribution to your church’s Earth ministry this past year.

This year, we offer six new certificates with themes ranging from climate change, to Standing Rock, to inspiring natural scenes and an Earth Day celebration (downloadable as PDFs):

We will publish the names of all Eco-Heroes, along with a one- or two-sentence description of their work, on UUMFE’s Congregational Eco-Heroes page. You may include the name and description with your Earth Day registration (last two items on the form).

Sample Eco_Hero CertificateAn Invitation from UU Young Adults for Climate Justice

This Earth Day Sunday, or any Sunday, consider bringing the voice of a UU young adult into your service or the pulpit. Our 100 Services for Climate Justice campaign, launched last year in conjunction with Commit2Respond, is eager to work with congregations and young adults who wish to take part. See a map of the successful services led by UU young adult ministers, seminarians, and lay volunteers to date and a list of their sermons.

Other Worship Resources

Check out our Inspiration and Worship page for a variety of Earth Day and environmental justice sermons and other worship elements. You can also find sermons on a variety of environment related topics on UUMFE’s sermons page.

Ideas for Earth Day Projects

We encourage you to explore our Take Action page for ideas for projects. You can also check out our Issue Areas page for issue-specific inspiration and resources, and our main Earth Day page for resources and action ideas from past Earth Days.

The generosity of individual donors and members make the work of UU Ministry for Earth possible. Please consider making a donation today to help us continue this important endeavor. Thank you.