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Richard Storey specializes in riverbed hydrology and ecology, but recently he has been refining arts and crafts lessons for women and teenagers in Lebanon. Storey works for A Rocha (arocha.org), an international Christian nature conservation organization, in the Aammiq Wetland area. The most significant freshwater wetland remaining in Lebanon, it serves as a vital stopping place for birds migrating from Asia, Africa and Europe.

That’s important, both for its biblical roots and for the unique niche A Rocha has filled in conservation circles, not an area ordinarily associated with Christianity. Last year, A Rocha International became the first Christian organization accepted for membership in IUCN, the World Conservation Union. It’s now working in 40 projects with field centers in eight countries, always aiming to put into practice the biblical call to care for all creation, its 2002 annual report states.

A Rocha focuses on scientific studies of important habitats and species, uniting people for environmental education and action, with special emphasis on students and school children. A Rocha involves staff and volunteers internationally and prioritizes areas in the world where resources for conservation and Christian witness are limited. In addition, the organization works with local and international agencies to protect key areas and environments.

A ROCHA LEBANON Since 1996 A Rocha Lebanon has offered core programs of weekly bird-counting and educational field trips for school children. Now Storey and other A Rocha staff are training local women in arts and crafts techniques while raising awareness of local environmental issues.

Around 100 women and teenage girls in three villages and a Bedouin camp have participated in the eight-week program “Celebrating Creation” since last year. The women learn to create flower stencils, butterfly seed pictures, wild brambles or birds from salt dough, and gold-string tree designs on terra-cotta pots.

While Storey and other program leaders are focusing on four environmental topics—flowers, insects, birds and trees—Celebrating Creation also teaches basic techniques used to produce items for sale in local gift and souvenir shops, says Laurel Sprenger of A Rocha Lebanon. A Rocha seeks to guard the bio-diversity of local environments while promoting sustainable development.

According to Storey, the program aims to reach people whose poverty and connection with the land cause them to be most deeply affected by environmental degradation.

THE ROCK A Rocha’s roots go back to 1983 when Peter Harris and his wife, Miranda, began developing a field center for Christian conservation at the Alvor estuary in southern Portugal. In this area severely threatened by rapid commercial development, they observed local birds and other species while promoting conservation.

The field center near the Alvor estuary is situated on an area known as Quinta da Rocha, the inspiration for the name “A Rocha,” Portuguese for “the rock.” “It seemed to do justice to all that we were planning—the beginning of field studies, geology, and the only sure foundation for the whole of life—the Rock who is Christ,” Harris said.

A Rocha is a worldwide community of Christians who are “pleading the cause of creation as part of normal Christian life and work, and are doing it in creative ways,” Harris said. The group works almost exclusively with national leaders who not only propose and plan new projects but also carry the vision for A Rocha’s ministry in each country.

In addition to its work in the Alvor estuary of Portugal and the Aammiq wetland in Lebanon, the organization is also providing environmental education in places like Kenya, France, the Czech Republic and England. The newest addition to the A Rocha family was launched this spring in India. Participants included leading Indian scientists and representatives from Dohnavur Fellowship, the Scripture Union and the Full Gospel Churches of India. A Rocha India is considering a project in the Kalrayan Hills of the Eastern Ghats (along India’s east coast)—an area threatened by slash-and-burn farming, uncontrolled hunting and illegal destruction of the forest.

KENYA: STUDENTS AND ECO-TOURISM The Arabuko-Sokoke Forest on Kenya’s coast is the last remnant of a rainforest that once stretched from Somalia in the north to Mozambique in the south. This forest was deteriorating little more than a decade ago. Now it and neighboring Mida Creek are the site of a thriving conservation and development project that hosts six globally-threatened bird species and endangered mangroves.

Threats facing the forest and creek included illegal logging, poaching and over-fishing by local people for subsistence. Families exploited the forest in order to pay for their children’s education and basic necessities.

Jacqui Kaye of A Rocha Kenya said that in 1991 in one district around the forest, “More than 90 percent of the children graduating from primary school did not go on to secondary school.” School fees are equal to or double the monthly income of most area families.

A tree house, a hanging mangrove walkway and a bird hide in the forest are part of A Rocha’s solution for easing the community’s financial strain. A Rocha developed ASSETS (Arabuko-Sokoke Schools and Eco-tourism Scheme), an eco-tourism program to support children’s education, in partnership with a UN environmental grant program and the Kipepeo Butterfly Project.

The profits from the forest’s visitor facilities help pay for children’s secondary school fees. Eco-tourism profits are distributed throughout the surrounding communities through partnerships with local hotels promoting eco-tourism.

“By supporting children, ASSETS is relieving the pressure on parents to exploit the limited natural resources, as well as spreading the financial benefits from eco-tourism,” Kaye said. Students and their families are also learning to protect the natural resources of the forest and creek. On “Beneficiaries’ Day,” students and their families can visit the bird hide and mangrove walk, and learn about the forest’s unique wildlife species. Many of them are surprised to discover that some wildlife, including birds such as Clark’s weaver and the Sokoke Scops owl, are found nowhere else in the world. Tourists travel thousands of miles to see them.

Last year the 53 student beneficiaries planted 4,500 seedlings in woodlots. When mature, these seedlings will provide the students’ families with an alternate source of income through the sale of wood for construction timber and firewood. This reforestation will also reduce the excessive logging that threatens the forest and creek.

CHRISTIAN WITNESS By living and working together, visitors and local communities experience the Christian character of A Rocha’s work. Through the study of nature, A Rocha helps communities understand that they are a part of God’s whole creation.

Additionally, A Rocha is committed to collaboration within the transnational scientific community. Its Christian witness takes place more through these relationships than through overt declarations of the gospel within their programs.

A Rocha strives to listen and learn from members of the scientific community who don’t know Christ. “Many committed and effective conservationists who visit A Rocha projects would not describe themselves as Christians,” Miranda Harris said. “Yet [they] have a profound respect—reverence even—for creation and have adjusted their lifestyles…in a way that puts many of us [Christians] to shame.”

But beyond working with the scientific world, Peter Harris hopes to “persuade the [global] Christian community that they cannot ignore what is effectively the most important issue of our times [caring for creation].” The Western world needs “A biblical view of life on earth.”

Web Sites on Christian environmental care www.arocha.org A Rocha promotes scientific studies and conservation of habitats, and provides local environmental education in 12 countries (see cover story).
www.ausable.org Au Sable Institute provides community and university courses on Christian environmental care. www.creationcare.org Evangelical Environmental Network educates North American Christians about global environmental issues (see article on p. 4).

www.creationcsp.org Creation Care Study Program offers semester-long, environmental studies courses for college credit at international field locations.

www.echonet.org ECHO (Educational Concerns for Hunger Organization) serves missionaries and national churches that work with small rural farmers and urban gardeners in developing countries.

www.floresta.org Floresta seeks to reverse deforestation by working with poor, rural farmers in the US, the Dominican Republic, Mexico and Haiti.

www.restoringeden.org Restoring Eden works with colleges, churches and communities to promote biblical environmental stewardship.

LACY D. NOETZEL is the laboratory associate in the Geology Department of Wheaton College, Wheaton, Ill.