People of God, Welcome Home
In 2024, Kirkwood was certified as an Earth Care Congregation by the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)'s Presbyterian Hunger Program. We have been recertified for the year 2025 as well.
Kirkwood is a Certified Wildlife Habitat as well.
Communication from the Sustainability Team
May 2025 - Bees pollinate 75% of the world’s natural food supplies. They are responsible for $17 billion in agricultural production each year in the United States. Honeybees alone pollinate 80% of all flowering plants, including 130 types of fruits, nuts and vegetables. Without bees, many people will face starvation. From June 2024 to February 2025, there was a 62% decline in the number of commercial honey bees; 2.7 million colonies were lost. There are many contributing causes: loss of natural spaces, climate change, adverse weather events, viruses and pesticides (including neonicotinoids on our ornamental flowers). Bees can only travel for thirty minutes before they run out of energy and require nectar to refuel. Large urban areas that lack significant flowering plants act as roadblocks, preventing bees from moving between major natural and agricultural areas. Hence the concept of bee roads was developed: small patches of pollinator plants in yards, gardens, roadsides and even flower pots that allow bees to rest and feed as they move around. The Sustainability Committee of Kirkwood Presbyterian Church has committed to the planting of bee roads in Cobb County, starting on our church grounds and asking our members to provide pollinator plants in their own yards. It is our hope that we can recruit other houses of worship to participate, and that the members of those congregations will join us in planting, until the bee roads spread all over Cobb County and beyond. Every road starts somewhere. Why not here?
May 2025 - “No Mow May,” “No Mow April,” or “Low Mow Spring” are initiatives supported by a variety of organizations including Bee City USA. The idea is to avoid or minimize mowing especially in the spring when wild native bees are actively building and provisioning their nests and their flower food is scarce. Manicured lawns are considered to be “biological deserts” because they are often monocultures offering little in the way of food for wildlife. By allowing our lawns to grow uncut for a month, spring wildflowers can bloom and help feed bees. The initiative also helps focus attention on the unsustainable nature and health threats of lawns and alternative ways to design our landscapes. For example, lawns are the largest irrigated crop by area in the U.S. covering 2% of our land surface area. Even worse, lawns use large amounts of energy, pesticides and fertilizers, creating a health hazard especially to the kids and pets that play on them and the wildlife that tries to feed there. It is ironic that the grassy areas that we create for our children to play on are intentionally treated with toxic chemicals. Health and environmental groups are calling for property owners to begin the transition to healthier yards and campuses by converting 10% of lawn area to native wildflowers and trees. For much more information on lawns and alternatives, visit BeeCityUSA.org. In the “Resources” drop-down menu, select “no mow may.”
Feb 2025 - Action alert: Advocating for our planetary home and God’s creation The number of problems facing our country and world is immense. Environmental issues like ensuring communities have access to clean water and air, protecting wildlife, plants, and the services they provide, and slowing climate change affect all of us. These problems disproportionally impact our most vulnerable populations and is important to advocate for them and for the future of our planet. Although we may currently feel overwhelmed by societal problems, it is important to not give up hope and keep advocating for causes important to us. Our elected officials have a duty to listen to and represent their constituents, and if they do not hear from us, they will be more likely to ignore this duty or assume we are all happy with how things are going. Click the button above for a brief guide for contacting your elected representatives. We have a few members of the Kirkwood Sustainability Team who are great at staying up to date with current legislation and sending updates about which bills to call or write our representatives about to the rest of the team. We are happy to forward these advocacy emails to anyone who is interested. To sign up for our Kirkwood environmental advocacy email alert list add your name and email to the following spreadsheet (Kirkwood Environmental Advocacy Updates) or email Kimmy at kkellett09@gmail.com. By staying informed and actively speaking out, you can help shape policies that protect God’s creation and our home for generations to come. Keep calling. Keep writing. Don’t lose hope!
Feb 2025 - It’s hard to imagine at this time of the year, but the steep bank next to the upper parking lot at Kirkwood has been receiving a lot of attention this past year. The “Ground Hogs” have been busy planting and watering during the drought so that the bank will one day have a cover of flowering plants that will stabilize the soil and attract pollinating insects and hummingbirds. Most of you probably noticed the plentiful butterflies visiting the stand of Zinnias and Cosmos plants, thanks to the beautiful pictures that Faye posted on Kirkwood’s Facebook page. If you are interested in helping the "Ground Hogs" gardening group with planting or maintenance, please let Pic Petelle (picp@aol.com) know. See the graphic below to see what plants we've planted at Kirkwood recently.
Jan 2025 - The Green Team has just completed Kirkwood’s application for recertification of our church as a PC(USA)-designated Earth Care Congregation for the year 2025. The process involves responding to more than 100 questions about “actions” that the church has taken that help protect or raise awareness about God’s creation. YOU can help with this process going forward. You can join the Green Team at Kirkwood and/or volunteer to take on or help with a project. The certification process even allows us to claim credit for certain things you do at home! Please let us know if you do any of the following during 2025 (or keep a list to give us in December): 1) use alternative transportation (walk, bike, or carpool) to go to church or to a church activity; 2) donate USED materials for re-use in social justice projects such as Habitat for Humanity, MUST, Family Promise (for example donating coats to Kirkwood’s current coat drive for MUST); 3) “embrace a radical lifestyle change” for environmental reasons (purchase an energy efficient appliance or windows for your home, purchase an energy efficient vehicle (switch to a hybrid or EV); 4) join a local, state, or national environmental organization to help with a specific environmental cause; 5) contact an elected official about an environmental issue based on something you learned from our Green Team or Outreach Committee. Thanks for all you do to help protect God’s creation! For more information, contact Pic Petelle (picp@aol.com; 770-789-5488).
Dec 2024 - Hey Kirkwood Presbyterian! Did you know that we have been certified as an Earth Care Congregation? This means that we have answered the General Assembly’s “call to restore the Creation” in the name of environmentalism and social justice. Our past and present Earth Care commitments fall into four categories: Worship: We have learned about earth care in sermons, featured locally grown and pesticide-free flowers in the sanctuary, and enjoyed our outdoor prayer labyrinth. Education: Children’s Sunday school classes have spent time outdoors, earth care-focused books are available in the church library, the youth have completed an earth care project, and educational events and messaging have been shared with the church community. Facilities: We have moved toward sustainability with our HVAC and lighting systems, recycled and composted waste, featured native plants on the church grounds, and utilized reusable plates and cups at church meals. Outreach: We have reused materials in social justice projects, written to elected officials about earth care, and gotten our church members outdoors. In 2025, we’ll be applying our actions from 2024 for recertification, and we’ll be taking further actions to strengthen our commitment to God’s creation. If you want to see the full list of actions we took in 2023 and 2024, contact Pic Petelle (picp@aol.com). Our Earth Care committee meets regularly to plan our next steps, and would love to hear from you if you have ideas or want to join the Green Team. Stay tuned for more information on what we can do to take better care of the world God has entrusted to us! Caitlin Conn
Here are some things Kirkwood is doing to care for the Earth:
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Compost at Fellowship events.
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Recycle paper bulletins.
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Hold education events about recycling, composting, plant based diets, native plants, and other Earth friendly practices.
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Work on planting more native plants on our grounds.
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Reuse what we can.
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Decorate with locally grown flowers.
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See Dec 2024 message above for more...
