China held a national conference on ecological and environmental protection on May 18 and 19, 2018, proposing to build an ecological civilization, China's official press agency Xinhua News reported. Over the years, the Chinese church has actively contributed to environmental protection in China.
Last September, a symposium on church environmental protection ministries was convened by the national CCC&TSPM and the Shaanxi CCC&TSPM to guide the church in China to discover potential environmental projects.
The Xi'an YMCA shared the overview and achievement of its project "Desert Tree Planting Service Camp" whose goal was to establish an evergreen forest covering 1,000 mu (164.7 acres) in a local desert and a mountainous area.
In 2010 and 2011, the Amity Foundation launched a campaign titled "Church Joint Environmental Protection Efforts". Bazaars were conducted in the churches across Jiangsu, welcomed by the local congregations. In September 2015, Changsha South Church held a bazaar that raised over 10,000 yuan for environmental projects. Many other churches also hosted similar low-carbon bazaars, like Beijing Chongwenmen Church and Qiqihar Enguang Church.
The Chinese Christians also were engaged in cleaning up rubbish. In May 2018, the youth fellowship of Harbin Hallelujah Church picked up litter in a charity hike. In November 2014, more than 18,000 Christians from Hunan Province joined in a weeklong campaign of cleaning up garbage in their mother river. Members from Beijing Haidian Church voluntarily collected rubbish in a mountaineering trip.
Meanwhile, Christians in China were involved in caring sanitation workers.
On May 1, 2018, the Huili County TSPM of Liangshan Yi Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan, distributed goods to 249 local sanitation workers. In September 2017, over 20 Christian volunteers from Shandong paid visits to about 200 street sweepers in four afternoons, giving them towels and water. A team from Zhengzhou Church, Henan, brought about 1000 kilos of watermelon to city hygiene workers who were working on a hot summer day of last July.
- Translated by Karen Luo
