Join NC Interfaith Power & Light’s lay and faith leader network for our Advocating with Compassion Day at the North Carolina General Assembly. Meet with your elected officials to hear their visions for NC’s future and to express your support for new and existing clean, renewable and energy efficient policies. Click here to find the contact information for your state legislators. An advocacy toolkit can be found by clicking here. Handouts and resources will be offered on Halifax Mall to assist in your meetings. National Interfaith Power & Light President, Susan Hendershot Guy, will be visiting…
Solar 101 for Congregations
North Carolina Interfaith Power & Light (NCIPL) Presents: Solar 101 for Congregations! Come learn how to harness the power of the sun at your worship facility. This free event will include food, a meet and greet with solar vendors, Solar 101 presentation, testimony from other worship facilities, and a question and answer portion. 6:00 Arrival and Refreshments 6:10 NCIPL Welcome and Introductions 6:20 NC Sustainable Energy Association – Story of H.B. 589 6:30 Solar Installer Presentation – Rebate program overview, installed project and process examples, Q&A 7:30 Duke Energy –…
DEQ Announces the Creation of a Secretary’s Environmental Justice & Equity Board
Last week North Carolina’s Department of Environmental Quality introduced members of the Secretary’s Environmental Justice and Equity Advisory Board during a ceremony in the agency’s Green Square Lobby. The scope of the Environmental Justice and Equity Advisory Board is to assist the Department in achieving and maintaining the fair and equal treatment and meaningful involvement of North Carolinians regardless of where they live, their race, religion or income with respect to the development, implementation, and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations, and policies. “These Board members have been tasked with working…
Solar 101 for Congregations – Raleigh
North Carolina Interfaith Power & Light (NCIPL) Presents: Solar 101 for Congregations! Come learn how to harness the power of the sun at your worship facility. This free event will include food, a meet and greet with solar vendors, Solar 101 presentation, testimony from other worship facilities, and a question and answer portion. 6:00 Arrival and Refreshments 6:10 NCIPL Welcome and Introductions 6:20 NC Sustainable Energy Association – Story of H.B. 589 6:30 Solar Installer Presentation – Rebate program overview, installed project and process examples, Q&A 7:30 Duke Energy –…
Politics of Eating
Sermon originally delivered at the Jack Crum Conference at Highlands United Methodist Church in Raleigh on Saturday, April 21. The primary text was Isaiah 55:1-9. My parents have an amazing garden. Besides the fact that it’s huge, it’s also bountiful. Its bounty comes from the gardeners who know how to get the most from their soil. My father understands the chemistry of soil—he knows which nutrients are lacking and puts them in; and he has a pond close at hand to help him out when the weather doesn’t cooperate with…
Sustainability Goals Delay Duke University Plans for Power Plant
Duke University officials have announced the indefinite delay of plans to build a freestanding Combined Heat and Power (CHP) plant and will instead focus its attention on expanding opportunities to use biogas and other environmentally friendly fuels for its growing energy needs. “Duke has an aggressive goal of becoming carbon neutral by 2024 while ensuring that the energy demands of a growing, vibrant campus can be met,” said Executive Vice President Tallman Trask III. “While CHP technology creates much greater efficiencies for both the consumer and the producer, we also…
Solar 101 for Congregations – Chapel Hill
North Carolina Interfaith Power & Light (NCIPL) Presents: Solar 101 for Congregations! Come learn how to harness the power of the sun at your worship facility. This free event will include food, a meet and greet with solar vendors, Solar 101 presentation, testimony from other worship facilities, and a question and answer portion. 6:00 Arrival and Refreshments 6:10 NCIPL Welcome and Introductions 6:20 NC Sustainable Energy Association – Story of H.B. 589 6:30 Solar Installer Presentation – Rebate program overview, installed project and process examples, Q&A 7:30 Duke Energy –…
Soul of Appalachia
Remarks originally delivered March 23 at The State of the Soul of Appalachia conference in Pipestem State Park in West Virginia. The heavens are telling the glory of God; and the firmament proclaims his handiwork. Day to day pours forth speech, and night to night declares knowledge. There is no speech, nor are there words; their voice is not heard; yet their voice goes out through all the earth, and their words to the end of the world. In the heavens he has set a tent for the sun, which…
Critical Issues Seminar: The Wisdom of Women
2018 is shaping up to the be the Year of the Woman. From the halls of government to stages and theaters from coast to coast, from marches and protest to industry strikes and the leadership of young students: Women are raising their voices and telling all of us about the world as they see it and the world they want to us become. It’s no surprise the North Carolina Council of Churches has chosen Wisdom of Women as the focus for their bi-annual Critical Issues Seminar. Partnering with a host…
Critical Issues Seminar: Wisdom of Women
The NC Council of Churches’ 2018 Critical Issues Seminar will focus on women. The theme for this daylong event is “The Wisdom of Women” and will cover topics such as the the Equal Rights Amendments, sexual harassment and work place policy, elected office, health care, and public education. This conference is for people of all ages, genders, and ethnic and racial backgrounds. Co-sponsors for this year’s event are AFL-CIO, Church Women United, Women Advance NC, MomsRising, NARAL, ERA NC, and the NC Faith Forward Coalition. Check-in will begin at 8:15…
NC Religious Leaders’ Letter Opposing Offshore Oil Drilling Delivered to DC
In response to President Donald Trump and Secretary of Interior Ryan Zinke’s proposal to auction off nearly every piece of America’s coastline to private oil companies, 34 religious leaders in North Carolina urged the Administration to invest in renewable energy instead of expanded fossil fuel exploration. The joint letter from the religious leaders comes at the end of a 60-day federal comment period that has seen heightened opposition to the Administration’s coastal drilling plan. The NC religious leaders are part of a larger 310-signer letter of religious leaders from across…
It’s Only 40 Days
Sermon delivered by Jennifer Copeland yesterday, Sunday, February 18 at Millford Hills United Methodist Church in Salisbury, NC. The lectionary texts were Genesis 9:8-17 and Mark 1:9-15. 40 days–rain! 40 days–wilderness! Noah and rainbows; Jesus and temptation. 40 is an important number in our faith tradition. There were 40 years in the wilderness for Moses and the Hebrew slaves who fled Egypt and 40 years of exile in Babylon for the people of Judah. Today, of course, we’re talking days and not years. What can happen in only 40 days?…
New Tax Law Will Harm Environment
The final version of the tax bill, passed in late December, will now open the pristine Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to oil drilling while maintaining a 14% cut in the corporate tax rate. This will allow oil and gas companies to gain and additional $1 billion in profits. In addition, oil and gas companies were granted increased ability to write-off new equipment expenditures. Republicans had to find ways to pay for their corporate tax cuts, which could cost up to $1.5 trillion. Alaska’s Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski stipulated she…
NCIPL Testifies at EPA Hearing on Clean Power Plan
Last week North Carolina Interfaith Power & Light spoke at the EPA public hearing in Charleston, West Virginia, on the proposed repeal of the Clean Power Plan. The EPA has proposed that the Clean Power Plan is not consistent with the Clean Air Act. The EPA held the public hearing on this critical issue in the heart of coal country. Faith leaders, including those from West Virginia Interfaith Power & Light, spoke in support of the Clean Power Plan because it sets flexible and achievable limits on otherwise unlimited dumping of carbon pollution from power…
United for Puerto Rico
Written by Council intern Yolanda Santiago-Correa. Yolanda is a Duke Divinity School student and was born and raised in Puerto Rico. September 20, 2017: a date that every Puerto Rican will remember forever. Six weeks ago, Hurricane Maria swept through the archipelago and created a crisis that, 47 days later, continues to threaten survival, take lives, and paralyze the 3.4 million inhabitants of the islands and the even larger number of us that are in the diaspora. In the days since Maria destroyed all that we knew, efforts have been…