The Hopedale UU Community is a recognized Green Sanctuary committed towards creating a religious community that has a fundamental, bottom-line, commitment to living in harmony with the Earth. We live this commitment at Hopedale in ways small and large. We use cloth napkins at our potlucks and smaller gatherings. We have reduced our building’s energy expenditure by purchasing a heat pump as an energy-efficient alternative to a traditional furnace, and have installed new LED lighting around our building.

The Social Justice Committee (SJC), Hopedale UU Community, has sponsored summer services that take a close look on how human activity can affect the health of Earth and the people who live there. We are active at the Earthfest celebration in Oxford and and participate in social witness concerning national and worldwide environmental issues.

The SJC is standing on the side of love for the rights of indigenous peoples and the environment. We made a donation of $200 to the Standing Rock Camp fund at Go Fund Me. We witnessed (thanks mostly to social media) a brutal militarized police response to the Water Protectors in North Dakota. We don’t dismiss them as mere ‘protestors’ for they are attempting at great personal risk to protect our most precious resource: water.

We are concerned about pollutants from oil and gas production including Methane, 87 times more powerful as a contributor to global warming than carbon in the atmosphere.  Additional concerns include major health risk toxins such as formaldehyde, benzene, acetaldehyde, and ethyl benzene. The threat is in our backyard. ¼ of all Americans living within the ½ mile threat radius of oil and gas production pollutants live in Ohio and Ohio ranks 10^th nationally in total population living within threat zones.

The SJC and Hopedale members take an active role in educational and witness activities that make a difference both regionally and and nationally.