We invite you to participate in Trinity’s Green Eating Challenge during Lent 2022! Why a “green eating” challenge? Climate change is a difficult and complex issue and finding ways to address it is daunting. Remedies for some of the issues will require governmental or corporate action. But collective individual actions can also have a significant impact. One of those individual actions is eating less meat and moving toward a more plant-based diet.
Our current level of meat consumption results in an inefficient use of land, water, and other resources, and causes increased greenhouse gas emissions. Those emissions harm the environment in various ways, including rising temperatures, more extreme weather events, droughts, and floods, which threaten our health and global food supply. Reducing meat consumption on a collective level would have environmental benefits, reducing those harms. On an individual level, people also find plant-based diets attractive due to health benefits and cost, as well as concerns over animal welfare. Learn more about the science on our reference page.
As Christians, we are called to take action to preserve the earth that God has given to us. From the time of creation, our faith has taught us that we are to be part of God’s care for the earth, and the life of all plants, animals, and humans with which we share our planet. It is part of our commitment to follow the great commandment Jesus taught: to love our neighbor as ourselves, doing our part to keep the earth a healthy, nurturing, and welcoming place for all. And active care for creation – and attention to the daily choices of our meals – helps connect us to awe, wonder, and joy at the marvelous ways our earth gives life, which can only strengthen the connection of our hearts and spirits to the presence of God.
A long tradition suggests that Christians fast from meat on Fridays in Lent. That tradition of self-denial has been to help us focus on our reliance on God. Now, as we better understand the impact of our food choices on the environment, fasting from meat one or more days each week is also a positive spiritual choice to join God in loving care for the earth and the human family.
Join us in making a commitment over Lent to eat “greener” by reducing your own meat consumption. That can include:
- Substituting pork, poultry, or seafood for red meat. (See the charts at footnote 2 and in the article at footnote 4 of the reference page that compares the energy efficiency and environmental impact of different kinds of meat, seafood, eggs, and dairy.)
- Preparing meals that contain less meat (for example, a stir-fry containing lots of veggies and a little bit of meat instead of a steak or chicken breast as the main part of the meal).
- Substituting vegetarian or vegan meals for meat-based meals a couple times a week.
- Substituting vegan meals for egg or dairy-based vegetarian meals a couple times a week.
Sign up for the Green Eating Challenge by clicking on the button above! And throughout Lent, send photos of yourselves enjoying greener meals to post on Trinity’s social media.
Not sure how to get started? Check out these tips and recipes. Concerned about nutrition if you’re moving to a mostly vegetarian diet? See this nutrition information page.
Thanks for joining us! Together, we can make an impact.