Story of Rooted
In 2022, as part of her PhD research, Rev. Konnie Vissers started The Children’s Garden Collective, which has since planted four urban children’s gardens through local congregations. This grassroots initiative has taught dozens of children how to grow their own food sustainably, and brought together churches at the edge of their neighbourhoods to engage local youth and children. In 2023, Rev. Vissers designed a summer camp curriculum integrating eco-theology and food justice into the children’s gardening efforts and has had over 90 campers experience Jesus’ love in the garden. Several other congregations have now inquired about starting their own children’s gardens and the need for resources to run summer camps that teach Jesus’ love and the value of creation.
Thus, an idea was born and a pilot project launched. Kortright Presbyterian Church received a Avondbloem grant from the Presbyterian Church in Canada in 2025 to plant a children’s garden on their several acre property in a neighbourhood of Guelph. The pilot project offered a five-week youth and eco-justice course for young community members who experience eco-anxiety. Vissers also designed a four-week Sunday school curriculum and implemented it alongside the planting of the children’s garden. In July, Kortright children’s garden hosted sixteen neighbourhood children for a one-day workshop exploring sustainable gardening, food justice, and environmental education. And in September, this initiative offered a five-week class for elementary aged children that engages themes of creation care, love of nature, and sustainable gardening, and included launching a greenhouse garden and planting a fruit tree guild. These educational efforts have offered children and youth an opportunity to connect to God in nature, transform our relationships with the planet, and take home free, organic produce to bolster food security in the neighbourhood.
Starting in January 2026, Rooted: Centre for Theology and Eco-Justice opened as a more robust ministry combining insights from the Children’s Garden Collective and the Avondbloem-funded pilot project. Rooted’s work seeks to ameliorate two challenges: the sharp decline in children and young people in North American churches,[1] and the need for local Christian churches to uphold justice in the face of climate changes—which disproportionately affect the poor and already marginalized populations.[2] With over 84% of young people globally experiencing at least moderate eco-anxiety,[3] the church must respond, and in ways that privilege the voices of young people and the marginalized. Rooted’s pilot project and future work speak hope in the midst of the climate crisis—teaching children the love of Jesus as well as engagement in positive climate efforts and local agriculture. This unique missional effort offers care for youth and children who experience eco-anxiety and attends to Jesus’ mandate, “Feed my sheep.” Not only are children and youth literally fed as a result of this work, young people are taught to grow food and given positive, spiritually-focused coping strategies that help us connect to God, to each other, and to creation.
[1] This is based on data available in the Acts and Proceedings demonstrating a decline in total membership and attendance nationwide, as well as experience with five different Presbyteries in the GTA identifying children and youth retention as a major challenge.
[2] Joyce Ann Mercer, “Children and Climate Anxiety: An Ecofeminist Practical Theological Perspective.” Religions 13, no. 10 (2022): 969.
[3] Hickman, Caroline, Elizabeth Marks, Panu Pihkala, Susan Clayton, R. Eric Lewandowski, Elouise E. Mayall, Britt Wray, Catriona Mellor, and Lise van Susteren. 2021. Climate anxiety in children and young people and their beliefs about government responses to climate change: A global survey. The Lancet Planetary Health 5: e863–e873