Transition Towns -
getting involved

Christian Ecology Link National Conference 2009

Ottery St Mary, Devon:  7 November

11am to 5pm

St Mary's Church, Ottery St Mary, Devon,

EX11 1DQ

Speakers and Panel members:

• Prof Tim Gorringe (Dept. of Theology, Exeter University. internationally renowned writer and speaker on theology and environmental ethics);
• Ben Brangwyn (Transition Town Totnes);
• Martyn Goss (Director, Church & Society, Exeter Diocese)
• Sara Drew (Founder Member of Sustainable Ottery).

Workshops led by Sustainable Ottery, Brother Sam SSF, and Martyn Goss will take place in other churches around the town. They will be on practical responses to the problems of climate change and peak oil.

Bus transport will be arranged from the railway station to Ottery St Mary.

Cost: £15 (£10 if booked a month before) to include lunch.

The conference is organized by CEL members at Ottery St Mary.

Enquiries and bookings: Mrs Jill Dixon, 35 Oak Close, Ottery St Mary EX11 1BB 01404 811067 cel2009booking@hotmail.co.uk

CEL's Annual Members' Meeting takes place at the same venue at 10am .

St Mary’s Church, Ottery St Mary, Devon EX11 1DQ at 10am

Download BOOKING FORM

What are Transition Towns?

Transition towns are a response to the two related problems of climate change and peak oil. Groups of people in transition towns seek ways of tackling climate change in their own community and becoming less reliant on oil. They are groups of people concerned about the state of the planet and ready to do something right now. Many people are already doing lots of things: recycling, buying locally, using low energy bulbs, growing vegetables, using alternative energy, taking the bus, walking to work and school, going on holiday in the UK . There are many Christians across the UK who are involved in their local transition initiative – either as a member of an organising group or as a participant in the various activities. Visit www.christian-ecology.org.uk/cit-leaflet.pdf for more on ‘churches in transition' ideas.

Who are the main speakers?

Conference keynote speaker Prof Tim Gorringe will help us begin to make the connections between our theology of hope for a future of restored relationships and repaired connections with one another and with the Earth community as a whole. Ben Brangwyn will speak from his practical experience working with Totnes, one of the first transition towns. Marytn Goss will make the connections on how these ideas can be integrated into the life of the church. See below for details.

Speakers and workshop leaders

Professor Tim Gorringe worked in parishes for six years before going to South India to teach theology at the Tamil Nadu Theological Seminary, where he worked for seven years. His links with India remain close. On return to Britain he was for nine years Chaplain, Fellow and Tutor in Theology at St John's College , Oxford . In 1995 he became Reader in Contextual Theology at St Andrew's and in 1998 took up his present post as St Luke's Professor of Theological Studies at Exeter University . His academic interests focus on the interrelation between theology, social science, art and politics. His most recent major book is a theology of culture. Aside from theology he is a bee keeper, poultry keeper, theatre goer, home wine maker, political activist, poetry lover and a member of the Iona Community.

Ben Brangwyn had put his ecological aspirations on the back-burner, spending many years quite successfully infiltrating the world of business and hi-tech, with occasional forays into charity work. Like many before him, the strain of disconnecting form a long-lost inner Gaian core was taking a heavy toll, especially with peak oil and climate change looking fast. However, finding out how to be part of the solution wasn't proving to be easy. And just when it was all looking a little tragic, an encounter with Stephen Harding of Schumacher College re-energised the eco-warrior. At that point, realising he could no longer be part of the problem, he backed irrevocably away form his bizarre day job of manipulating pixellated abstractions while feigning enthusiasm and started plating acorns with a vengeance. Once he ran out of acorns he co-founded Transition Network with Rob Hopkins. And ever since, he's been putting all his efforts into helping nurture the accelerating emergence of a network of communities that aspire to implement the fast developing transition model. Ben has two sons, Josh 19, Ollie 17, and hopes they'll inherit a human-scaled world.

Martyn Goss is a native Devonian with a professional background in teaching and Christian education. He has spent most of his career involved in community work and community development and worked previously as Social Responsibility Officer with the Board for Christian Care. He is now Director, Church & Society, Exeter Diocese. He is CofE co-founder of the European Christian Environment Network (ECEN) and an active member of
the ECEN Enabling Team. His interests include gardening, wildlife, amateur dramatics and Napoleonic history, as well as films and reading. He is a Trustee of Exeter Community Initiatives, Devon Global Centre, and chairs the Cammpaign for Better Transport in Devon and the Devon Faiths Forum. His joys in life are making people laugh and making them think!

Brother Sam SSF is from Hilfield Friary in Dorset . The Hilfield Peace and Environment Project seeks to express and share an 'integrated ecology' for the sake of and out of love for the world.

Francis of Assisi, in his living the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the full, gives us an example of three ecologies:

• an environmental ecology, living in harmony with creation
• a social ecology, knowing all people as brothers and sisters
• a spiritual ecology, in praise of God as Father and Creator of all things

Hilfield Friary is set on the north-facing slope of the Dorset Downs, an Area of Outstanding Natural beauty with views over the Blackmore Vale and towards the Mendip Hills. Part of their nineteen acres has been designated as a site of Special Nature Conservation Interest, and a Countryside Ranger has described their grassland as 'one of the finest wild-flower meadows in Dorset'. Adjacent to their land the Dorset Wildlife Trust has recently acquired Hendford Coppice, a richly diverse area of woodland. Their aim is to manage their land to enable the greatest possible diversity of plant life and animal habit. Visit www.hilfieldproject.co.uk

Sustainable Ottery consists of a group of local people working to create a sustainable community, a greener, healthier, more connected place to live, much less dependent on resources and solutions from 'out there'. Since February 2007 they have grown from three people to a core group of sixteen and a mailing list of over 150. They have held film screenings, a Green Family Day and successfully lobbied the council to adopt the Feniton to Sidmouth cycle path in its local plan. They began from the view that our current resource hungry life style is unsustainable and that fossil fuels which supply us cannot last forever. It is our hunger and over consumption of such fuel that has led to the global warming crisis which we now face.