I was recently asked to create an article for Harrogate Talking Newspaper on this topic and here is an edited version

Many of us are interested in monuments from past times, including those we find in churchyards. What do they tell us about what mattered to our ancestors and how are we speaking forward to future generations about our values and beliefs?

There are many reasons why it’s important to think about how as a church community we curate and manage our churchyards. The growing awareness of environmental issues throughout society, including churches of every denomination, reminds us of the biblical charge to be effective stewards of creation, and in a time of undeniable climate change, this is one that Christians take ever more seriously.

All Church of England priests and congregations are called to work towards five marks of mission, the fifth of which is ‘to strive to safeguard the integrity of creation, and sustain and renew the life of the earth.’ Many churches are now managing at least part of their churchyard for conservation, in the hope of encouraging an increasing diversity of wildflowers, plants, bugs, bees and butterflies to make it their home. From these churchyard trailblazers we’ve learned it takes some years to re-establish a beautiful and sustainable eco-system but also how much the result is valued by the whole community, not just the church.

Why does Cayton parish see ecology as so important, you may wonder? The hard evidence of global warming is undeniable. From heat waves and wildfires to downpours and flooding, the last two years alone have given us a glimpse of what is coming and how it is likely to escalate over succeeding decades, Sadly, the impact of climate change will undoubtedly hit the poorest countries hardest, despite them being least guilty of excessive carbon consumption.

Here in the UK, since 1970 more than half of our flowering plants, mosses and their relatives have been lost from the countryside. Over the same time, pollinators such as bees, hoverflies and moths, have decreased by 18% on average, and more alarmingly, over the last five years, 48% of our bird species have significantly declined. But you don’t need me to tell you this – you’ll have heard it from many other creditable sources. Such evidence can be so overwhelming many of us would rather not think about it, or dismiss it, but if we discuss this with our children and grandchildren, who will have to live with our legacy, we are likely to find ourselves engaging with a different perspective.

Even if the reality of what is happening is hard to face, we are not powerless to make a difference, however. We can, we should and within Cayton Parish will try to make a difference; and if all churches, other places of worship, institutions, councils and simply any individual who has a bit of garden or even a window box joins in, we can create a safety net of rich habitats that will make a measurable and important difference to the world our children and grandchildren inherit from us.

So, what are we actually doing? In each of our five main churchyards, we have designated up to 50% of the land for conservation or re-wilding, mainly around the edges, and/or where the graves are much older and not actively visited or tended by loved ones. In these areas, we allow the grass to grow long, so any wildflowers and all the life they sustain can better establish and thrive and we’re experimenting with if and when to cut it back for greatest environmental benefit. Our sixth churchyard, up at the Old Tower (from where the subsiding Bishop Thornton Church was moved nearly 200 years ago) is already gloriously re-wilded and managed by a diligent farmer (and wildlife expert) who grazes sheep there twice a year, which one of the traditional ways of managing wildflower meadows.

We’re encouraging birds by not only providing them with wild food and habitats in re-wilded areas, but during a family fun day we made over 30 varied bird boxes to encourage a greater diversity of nesting birds. It’s a common mistake to assume all birds nest in trees – many don’t – and the hedgerows, open barns and old walls and so on, which were their traditional nesting sites, are fast disappearing. At another family day we created butterfly, bee and bug hotels from recycled wood and fillings such as pinecones and drilled small logs - one for each churchyard.

It is beginning to work – at Markington Church, after just one year, we‘ve had the return of many wildflowers, including cowslips, speedwell, fox and cubs, and a common spotted orchid (which isn’t common at all)! Let’s be honest, how much biodiversity is there in a mown lawn, by comparison?

How is this being received, you may ask? Overall, very well, especially by those for whom sustainability and protecting the environment are key issues. Communicating as widely as possible about what we’re doing and why, and explaining that re-establishing wildflowers meadows doesn’t happen instantly, can be more difficult than you’d imagine, but we keep trying. As with anything new in church life, though, some objections have been raised and they tend to focus on two issues.

Firstly, some people feel it’s not respectful to change the tradition of what a churchyard ‘should’ look like as in, very clipped and neat. If you think about it, though, traditionally all churchyards – indeed all memorials, going way back to stone circles and barrows – would have been wildflower meadows, left long because it simply wasn’t possible to keep it constantly trimmed. The era of closely mown churchyards is surprisingly recent, since the advent of more cheaply available power mowers. Indeed, one Eco-group member showed us pictures of his wedding in the early1980s where the churchyard grass was at least knee-high and at that time, in many places this was the norm. I might add that the photos were taken in one of our very own churchyards!

Secondly, a few individuals have complained about the conservation areas looking scruffy and in one case the word ‘abandoned’ was used. It’s always acknowledged that ‘beauty is in the eye of the beholder’ and sometimes we must simply agree to differ about what we think is beautiful. The plan of having at least 50% of each churchyard regularly mown is an attempt to acknowledge both perspectives. It is a fact, though, that patterns in funerals and memorials are changing with many people now seeking more natural and environmentally friendly resting places for their loved ones. This has been the case within my own immediate and extended family and opened my mind to how we do, indeed, speak forward to future generations about what we value and believe. As with all things, the times are a-changing.

Finally, what do we plan for the future? We learn something new each year and our mowing schemes are adjusted accordingly. We plan to mow the edges of the conservation areas next year, so that it is more obvious they are being managed and we just keep trying to talk to people and engage them positively.

Like every voluntary institution in the country, churches are short of both funds and volunteers. With the limited resources we have, we are trying to do our best to honour the dead, create a place of peace for the bereaved, beauty and interest for visitors and above all, celebrate and seek to protect the glorious but fragile and currently degraded natural world that is our gift from God.

I’ll end with three verses from Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard, written by the poet Thomas Gray, in 1750, which reminds us that churchyards have traditionally always been wild places where the diversity of flora and fauna can be a joy and an inspiration to our minds, bodies and spirits.

Now fades the glimm'ring landscape on the sight,

And all the air a solemn stillness holds,

Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,

And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds;

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tow'r

The moping owl does to the moon complain

Of such, as wand'ring near her secret bow'r,

Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade,

Where heaves the turf in many a mould'ring heap,

Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.