Two Ocean Township faith communities are joining forces this April to demonstrate that love for God’s creation knows no religious bounds.

Working together, the Catholic community of St. Anselm Parish, Wayside, and St. George Greek Orthodox Church, Ocean Township, will take part in a Clean Ocean Action Beach Sweep at Gateway National Recreation Area, Sandy Hook, April 9 from 9 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. Volunteers will pick up litter and document their findings while improving the shoreline and fulfilling the papal directive of Laudato Sí.

St. Anselm Parish has had a Creation Care team since late 2018, when a few parishioners started to discuss Pope Francis’ encyclical ‘Laudato Sí,’ explained ministry member Mary McCauley. “Clear that immediate action was needed to save our common home, we formed a small team of passionate and interested parishioners and planned a series of monthly gatherings to provide information to other interested folks,” she said.

The new ministry examined such topics as plastic pollution, recycling, solar conversion, climate change, composting, understanding sea level rise, native plants and the importance of bees and butterflies. Though the onset of COVID-19 curtailed public meetings in March 2019, members of the group continued to keep in touch over Zoom, McCauley reported. “Through the work of the Holy Spirit and some creative outreach on our part,” she said, “we met some individuals at St. George’s doing the same work and having the same reactions of denial and disinterest as we were having.”

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The goals of St. Anselm’s Creation Care team synced perfectly with those of the Greek Orthodox Church’s “Caring for God’s Creation: Environmental Stewardship and Protection” group. Plans for an ecumenical event bore fruit March 5 as St. George Church hosted two films: “Catholicism and the Challenge of Ecology,” and “The Face of God,” which spoke to how the Greek Orthodox Church is responding to climate change. Both films were well-received and attended by about 40 people.

The April 9 beach sweep, one of more than 70 planned by Clean Ocean Action that day, is the two groups’ first public ecumenical project, noted St. Anselm parishioner and Creation Care ministry member Elizabeth Domigan. Interested parishioners and community members are encouraged to work alongside ministry members. Not merely a trash collection, volunteers will tally and document their findings so that Clean Ocean Action can identify pollution problems and remedies.

Domigan chuckled as she recalled the non-profit organization’s reaction to their registration for the event.

“They said they were used to [Boy and Girl] Scouts signing up,” Domigan said. “We were their first church group.”

Clean Ocean Action is a leading national and regional voice working to protect waterways using science, law, research, education and citizen action. Their web address is cleanoceanaction.org.

The beach sweep begins in Lot D of the park with orientation at 9 a.m. To register, contact Greg Held at [email protected].  For more information on the St. Anselm Parish Creation Care ministry, contact Mary McCauley at [email protected], or call St. Anselm Parish at 732-493-4411.