YBA and the BUEN

We are pleased to be able to share the news of a new YBA rep for BUEN - the Baptist Union Environment Network. Rod writes…….

Hello, I’m Rod MacRorie, now an associate minister at Cemetery Road Baptist Church Sheffield, and recently appointed a representative for BUEN (the Baptist Union Environment Network) for the YBA.

BUEN - Spanish for 'good' - aims to inspire and enable our network of churches to:

• recognise the goodness of God’s creation

• share in God’s mission to care for it and respond to the climate and environmental crisis in practical ways at local, regional and national levels

• work for justice for creation and people impacted by environmental change.

It’s a challenging time in many ways for engaging in climate and environmental issues, both within wider society and our churches. I would like to take the opportunity to raise up engagement with environmental issues with the Mission Forum resolution being considered across our Baptist Together family which speaks of "care for creation" as part of sharing in God's mission alongside evangelism .

Here’s a link to a brief video message I gave ahead of COP30 in 2025.

At the upcoming Baptist Assembly 2026 in Harrogate we plan to have a BUEN stand in the Networking Zone as a focus of conversation for environmental issues, and introduce a new project for ‘whole earth discipleship’ called Entwined. It would be good to see you there! 

Meantime, it would be good to hear about member churches’ engagement with Eco-Church. I’m aware that 15% of YBA churches are registered, with 14 having gained an award. I would welcome people get in touch with me and tell me how it’s going.

I look forward to hearing from you!