blogtcs.com

My mug reminds me daily of what we should recycle beyond the traditional paper, glass and cardboard.

Every April I try to keep my eyes peeled for eco-friendly parishes, schools, groups and ministries. The hope is to put a Catholic twist on Earth Day and remind readers that taking care of the planet is a year-round job.

In 2007, I highlighted local Catholics who recycle — paper, ink cartridges and plastic — and those who tend gardens and carpool. Last year, I highlighted the greener habits many religious sisters in the diocese are taking on. A November blogpost also recapped local Catholic efforts to embrace America Recycles Day.

This year I’ve noticed:

• Catholic Greetings is offering an array of free e-greeting cards to celebrate Earth Day.
• St. Gabriel the Archangel Parish in Cave Creek has a Go Green fundraiser. The online retailer gives 20 percent back to the parish. All products are eco-friendly.
• St. Louis the King School in Glendale just made $450 for recycling plastic bags with Wal-Mart for the last five months. The school is shooting for $900 next year. Students are also working with Terracycle to recycle juice pouches, snack-sized chip bags and cookie wrappers. The school earns two cents per wrapper. See what else the company recycles.
• St. Mary Magdalene Parish in Gilbert is conducting an ongoing “can”paign to complement its building campaign. Parishioners donate their empty soda cans — the religious education program has held special collection contests with the students —  and money from its recycling will bump up the building fund.

Be sure to read until the end for statistics and other tidbits on waste and recycling. 

St. Gregory School recycled its old event T-shirts and turned them into a quilt. It will be auctioned off May 2.

I’ve also run across a bunch of ways schools are conserving and recycling:

• Most Holy Trinity School and St. John Vianney School in Goodyear use SchoolReach and Instant Alert respectively for urgent parent notifications. The systems cut down on paper use. Our Lady of Perpetual Help School in Scottsdale only sends home notices with the youngest student. 

• St. Gregory School collected leftover T-shirts from past school events and turned them into a quilt. Patches from surplus school uniforms compliment the T-shirts. The quilt will be auctioned off at the school’s “Big Kahuna, Tiny Bubbles” fundraiser May 2.
• St. John Bosco School held an Earth Fest April 8. Patrice Whalen, the school’s science teacher, brought in community representatives from Phoenix’s recycling and environmental services departments among a host of other guests from Arizona Game and Fish, the Natural Resources Conservation Service, no-kill animal centers and more. “In order to save the animals, we have to save the environment,” Whalen said.
• Nearly 190 trees are being planted in St. John Bosco’s name for its participation in American Publishers’ “Go Green” project.  

I also found the following tidbits from a recent St. John Bosco newsletter fascinating:

A Catholic Greetings image.

Below are a few “Did you knows” 

• Manufacturing plastic — which the world produces and uses 20 times more today than 50 years ago — requires significant quantities of resources, primarily fossil fuels. Some plastic is hazardous.
• From 1972 to 2003 we threw away over 1 trillion aluminum cans. That’s enough metal in aluminum to replace the world’s entire commercial fleet of boats 36 times and enough cans to circle the globe 3,048 times.

Cleaning tips:
-Vinegar and salt make a great “green” all purpose cleaner.
-Toothpaste makes an effective and cost-efficient gold cleaner.

Glass
-Using recycled glass saves 50% energy compared to virgin glass.
-Recycled glass generates 20% less air pollution and 50% less water pollution.
-One ton of glass made from 50% recyclables saves 250 lbs. of mining waste. 

Paper
-Recycled paper saves 60% energy.
-Recycled paper generates 95% less air pollution each ton.
-Recycling of each ton of paper saves 17 trees and 7,000 gallons of water.