Mother Earth needs love, too

Semi-retirement offers time to enjoy — and clean up — the surroundings. The 4th annual Green Team Summit strives to inspire the religious community to do the same.

The Green Team Summit is being hosted by the Field Museum from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 14. The event offers attendees workshops on topics such as “How to Reduce Energy Usage,” and “Why Waste Our Grandchildren’s Water.”

The Green Team Summit is being hosted by the Field Museum from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 14. The event offers attendees workshops on topics such as “How to Reduce Energy Usage,” and “Why Waste Our Grandchildren’s Water.”

Provided photo

If you had told me 30 years ago that one day I would eagerly turn in my reporter’s notebook for an apron, I would have laughed in your face.

But that’s precisely what I did when I decided a couple of months ago to enter a phase of my life that I’m calling semi-retirement.

While I still want to hear from readers with concerns about our great city, I’ll be writing two or three times a month, instead of three times a week.

Hopefully, the rest of the time I’ll be out and about learning new things and checking off my bucket list.

While I had dreams that my retirement would be spent enjoying great adventures, that was wishful thinking.

So far I’ve spent most of my newly acquired free time either in the kitchen playing chef or maneuvering through traffic jams that make dropping off my granddaughter at her middle school a test of my Christian faith.

Grandparents, you know the drill.

The rush-hour tie-ups on the Kennedy or the Eisenhower Expressways are frustrating, but that’s nothing compared to the congestion that occurs in neighborhoods when an army of grandparents descend upon a school.

Now that I’m not rushing everywhere, I really do notice the trash, broken glass and fast food wrappers and other stuff people throw on the sidewalks or in the streets as if somehow it will magically disappear.

Frankly, the litter along our roadways and bus stops is visible proof that many of us are doing a poor job taking care of the earth.

That’s where events like the upcoming Green Team Summit come in.

If you ever wondered what green technology is all about, this summit should prepare you to at least respond to a tweet about it.

“This is our 4th annual Green Team Summit and we expect over 500 people to come out. It is the only event of its kind in the Midwest and we have a very diverse group racially, ethnically and religiously,” said Veronica Kyle, statewide outreach director for Faith in Place, an advocacy organization tackling issues of environmental sustainability.

The free event is open to the public and is being hosted by the Field Museum from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. this Saturday.

A Chicago native, Kyle joined the Faith in Place staff in 2008. Before then, she lived and worked for 12 years in the Caribbean and southern Africa in the areas of social justice and development.

Kyle helped organize the first Green Team Summit four years ago and has witnessed the impact it has had on diverse congregations.

“We gather faith leaders, lay leaders and clergy and show them how to be better stewards of the earth,” she said.

“Since 1999, Faith in Place has worked with over 1,000 houses of worship throughout Illinois to protect our common land, water, and air,” according to a news release.

Its Green Team Summit offers attendees workshops on topics such as “How to Reduce Energy Usage,” and “Why Waste Our Grandchildren’s Water.”

There’s even a workshop that Kyle is co-facilitating on “Worshipping in Nature.”

While it won’t have the same flavor as the “Sunday Service” hip-hop star Kanye West recently put on at Northerly Island, it is in the same vein.

“In feeding our spirit, we can get out of the four walls,” said Kyle.

About 130 green teams will participate in Saturday’s summit.

Cook County Board President Toni Preckwinkle is set to offer opening remarks and the Rev. Clare Butterfield will give the keynote address.

When you are managing a demanding career and raising a family, it is easy to forget that the earth needs you too.

The next time I spot a discarded bottle on the beach, I’ll take the time to pick it up.

That’s the beauty of being semi-retired.

You have time to do stuff like that.

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