gcm

Written by Saba Khan, EnviroMuslims.

Art by Shannon Loomer of ThinkLink Graphics

We are delighted to announce that our Greening Canadian Mosques (GCM) program in partnership with EnviroMuslims has received new funding from Olive Tree Foundation.

Launched in 2020, GCM empowers mosque management teams, as well as mosque-goers, with the tools they need to understand environmental issues and take appropriate action.

Greening Canadian Mosques: Climate Conversations is phase three of the GCM program. 

It will build upon the communications package and toolkit developed in the previous phase of the project specifically for Canadian mosques to help guide them in improving sustainable practices, reducing carbon emissions, and reducing costs. 

“The first program of its kind in Canada, Climate Conversations will continue engaging a broad range of community partners and stakeholders that include both Imams and management teams, as well as youth leaders from Canadian universities and colleges who will share inspiration and best practices,” says Michelle Singh, FCG’s Executive Director.

“Climate Conversations will not only give Imams an opportunity to participate in peer-to-peer learning sessions and trainings, it will offer a platform to a generation of diverse Muslim youth to share their concerns but also, solutions to challenges their local mosques are facing when it comes to implementing sustainability programs and engaging with their local communities,” says Saba Khan, Co-Founder and Director of Community Outreach at EnviroMuslims.

Ten GCM Community Ambassadors (Muslim Canadians) from across the country will be selected through an online hiring process and trained to recruit mosques in their provinces to sign up for the program. They will help facilitate webinars for Muslim leaders and community members that align with the content of the toolkit, as well as encourage participation in workshops and trainings related to taking climate action and learning about environmental sustainability.

Empowering Canadian mosques to take climate action

Greening Canadian Mosques

In partnership with EnviroMuslims, Faith & the Common Good is working with Canadian mosques to embed sustainability in their operations and provide them with the tools they need to identify, track, and deliver resource efficiency opportunities. The overall objectives of the Greening Canadian Mosques program are to:

• Increase environmental and economic viability by providing Canadian mosques and their management teams with tools and resources to improve water and energy conservation, and waste management, while identifying potential facility cost savings.
• Create opportunities to build relationships between mosques and local communities to enhance environmental literacy and embed a sense of responsibility and love for caring for the natural environment.
• Bring greater public awareness to mosque-goers to adopt sustainable behaviors and increase environmental literacy among community members.

Mosques not only serve as a place of worship and a place to generate economy, education, and social cohesion of the community, they also serve as an influential medium for spiritually and behaviorally congruent environmental sustainability interventions. In fact, in a recent survey conducted by EnviroMuslims, 98.4% of Canadian Muslims agreed that mosques have an important role in inspiring the Muslim community to care for nature.

The Greening Canadian Mosques program is the first of its kind in Canada and is a call to action for Canadian Muslims to tread softly on the planet and rethink their impacts on the natural environment.

Take the Pledge

Already taken the pledge?
Click on the links below to access the Greening Canadian Mosques resources.

Toolkit Communications Package