What is a transition town, you may wonder.  It sounds like something unachievable and so it can seem at times.  The movement to start these was begun by an Englishman, Rob Hopkins, firstly in Kinsale, Ireland and then in Totnes, Devon as the first official Transition Town.  The impetus behind this was ‘peak oil’. What would it be like when the oil ran out? We need to become less dependent on oil and to learn to use and rely on more local and sustainable resources.

Totnes has even started its own currency which is useable in many of its local shops and businesses.  My own small town of Ottery St Mary has been inspired to make a start with “Sustainable Ottery”.  It is trying to set up local food networks and, without going back to the old peasant,  mediaeval ways to try to encourage people to see themselves as community and to use local knowledge and resources in a way that complements modern life but which will wean us off products that may well ‘run out’ in time. 

This of course gives the opportunity to try to reduce carbon emissions and dependence on fossil fuels, to meet the challenge of possible climate change and to build the community’s resilience so that whatever shocks we may   receive from the outside there is a measure of self reliance in areas such as food, energy, health care, job and economics.  Some of this is  caricatured as being ‘pie in the sky’ and well it might be but if we as  Christians cannot join in to give an example of trying to honour and respect the planet God has put at our disposal then what are we really saying about our faith?  

Many in this Transition movement are not Christian, nor indeed of any faith, but people of vision and imagination who with us try to show their commitment in what we all believe should be our stewardship of the earth.  To this end my own church has its ‘Green Apostle’ and is trying to be as eco friendly as possible, as are many churches in this country.  We have a stall at the monthly sustainable Ottery Community Market,  generating some much needed funds, but our main aim is to show that we are there, part of the community, out in  it, not afraid of getting our hands dirty nor our feelings squashed. We must be seen to be  not just a holy huddle on top of the hill in our Grade 1 listed mediaeval    building but as people who care and who have something to offer that is priceless!

These Transition Towns are popping up in many areas: Brighton, Hove, South Somerset District Council, Fujino in Japan, towns in the North of England.  Will they succeed?  We will never know if we lack the courage to try to make them work.  
Read Hopkins’ ‘The Transition Handbook’ for a glimpse of a visionary spirit and put some real biblical thinking behind your reactions.  Many of the concerns are there in the Old Testament showing us that we have not made much progress as a human race over the millennia!  So what are we as Christians of today going to do about tomorrow for the heritage we hope to hand on to our children?

Much has been made of the places where plastic bags are banned but this is much more than that. We need a commitment to be adventurous.  In recent months President Obama’s wife has started to grow vegetables in a small part of the White House grounds.  A gimmick: perhaps, but it is small things like this that are within the grasp of most of us.  I am reminded of Evelyn  Underhill’s poem ‘Immanence’:

“I come in the small things said the Lord”

and that is where we could start by researching the small towns that are   trying to make a difference.  
How about it?

Shirley-Ann Williams