Green gift-giving
Photo by Mel Poole (Unsplash.com)
This Christmas season take to heart John Wesley’s Rule for Christian Living: “Do all the good you can, by all the means you can, in all the ways you can, in all the places you can, at all the times you can, to all the people you can, as long as ever you can!” “Doing good” doesn’t have to be expensive. Be thoughtful about what you give, especially in relation to caring for creation and justice.
When you shop online for gifts, check the “About” portion of the website before you buy. Find out what the company is or is not doing to care for creation and justice. Support those sources that help, not harm. Look for B Corp and other companies that give back 1% for the planet.
Creation Justice ident
Give Fair Trade presents this Christmas. Buying Fair Trade provides the creators—farmers, laborers, and artisans—fair prices and stable incomes, reduces poverty, creates betters working conditions, and promotes environmentally sustainable practices. It’s a just and good deal for all! If you want to give Fair Trade coffee, explore the Velasquez Family Coffee website (vfamilycoffee.com).
Choose earth-friendly gifts that keep giving, for example: a shampoo bar, a package of wooden clothes pins to use instead of plastic “chip clips,” jams or other preserves from local farmers, a roll of bamboo toilet paper from Who Gives a Crap, a bracelet made of plastic recovered from an ocean, a bamboo toothbrush, a packet of seeds for native plants or wildflowers. Sustainable presents spark good conversation.
Buy children’s gifts with sustainability in mind. Will the toy sustain the child’s interest? Is playing with it 90% kid and 10% toy or 90% toy and only 10% kid? Is it made of sustainable materials? Will it be something that can eventually be passed along to another child?
Christmas shop without plastic bags. We’ve been learning to take our own reusable bags to the grocery store. The same principle works in retail stores. Carry in your own bags, politely decline the store’s plastic ones, and tell the clerks you are cutting down on single-use plastic. It’s your gift to the planet.
Buying clothes for Christmas gifts, read the labels. Avoid fossil-fuel-based synthetics (polyester, nylon, acrylic, spandex, lycra). When washed, the synthetics release microplastics that enter the water systems and then the food chain, harming marine life and ultimately humans. Choose items made of natural fibers (organic cotton, linen, wool, silk, hemp, bamboo), recycled fibers, or sustainable plant-based Tencel.
If giving money is your default, consider purchasing stock on the recipients’ behalf in renewable energy, for example (possibly solar or wind). Add a note that you are investing with hope for their future that they live securely in a sustainable world. Throughout the year, as the stock reports come, the two of you will have opportunity to talk about what you value both in terms of money management and care for the Earth.
Thinking big this Christmas? Consider appliances, solar panels, tankless water heater, low-flow water-saving faucets and toilets, replacement windows, additional insulation, LED lights, even an electric car. Prioritize decisions that contribute to energy efficiency. Upgrade your home to care for your other home: Earth.
Give presence, not just presents. Give an adventure—an experience that can be shared, talked about, and remembered long after the usual “stuff” has been covered over in the landfill.