By Ann Kuffner
The Earth Day theme for 2023 is “Invest in Our Planet”. Each year the negative impacts of climate change become clearer. Communal action – such as that of the Tikkun Eco Center of San Miguel – provides a vital response. Tikkun promotes replicable solutions to regional climate change and ecological crises. Its three hectares are dedicated to permaculture – with organic gardens and orchards; reforestation; solar and wind energy; adobe construction; fish and chicken farming; composting; and water harvesting systems.
It has become essential to restore the region’s traditional water capturing systems, especially for rural farming villages. Tikkun and sister NGOs, coordinating with San Miguel’s Ecology Department, are applying their experience restoring watersheds and water harvesting systems to restore and reforest 20 community reservoirs. They plan to also extract thousands of cubic meters of invasive water hyacinths from the Presa Allende and use them as compost.
Tikkun’s c-founders – Victoria Collier and Ben Ptashnik – will explain how Mexico can benefit from successful rural restoration projects in India, Africa and China.
An entrepreneur, human rights activist, philanthropist, and environmental leader, Ben-Zion Ptashnik retired as a state senator from Vermont in 2001 to pioneer solar and wind energy and mitigate the climate crisis in Mexico.
A writer, artist and grower, in the early 2000s, Victoria Collier co-founded and directed Tierra Lucero, a non-profit organization located on a permaculture demonstration site designed by Bill Mollison in Taos, New Mexico. She oversees the development of farm and community outreach programs at Tikkun Eco Center.
Unitarian Universalism is a liberal faith inviting its community to gather around a set of harmonizing values and principles for living. Our UU Fellowship welcomes people of all ages, races, religions, sexual orientation, and gender identity. Belief in a divinity is not the central issue around which we gather for worship and generous action. Rather, we come together with a belief in community, love, compassion, social justice, reverence for nature, and the spirituality of music, all within the interconnected web of existence.
UUFSMA donates generously to support nonprofit organizations that provide health, educational, and environmental services for underserved communities in the San Miguel region. Please support this work by clicking on the website home page Donate button.
To participate in our online Sunday Service, visit www.uufsma.org and click on the Zoom Service button on the home page. If requested, enter password: 294513. Sign-in from anywhere Sunday mornings between 10:15-10:25am CST. Enjoy previous services at https://www.youtube.com/UUFSMA.
In addition to continuing live Zoom services, UUFSMA has returned to in-person Sunday services. Masks are optional, but a distanced area is reserved for those preferring. UUFSMA meets at the Hotel Posada de la Aldea on Ancha San Antonio 15.
Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Sunday Service
“Earth Day – How Tikkun Eco Center is Investing in Our Planet”
Ben-Zion Ptashnik and Victoria Collier
Sun., Apr 30, 10:30am
Posada de la Aldea Hotel
Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/414604040
Password: 294513
