Back to Newsby Ashley Burke, consultant, Newfoundland and Labrador Multi-Materials Stewardship Board (MMSB), in working with the sisters and staff at Presentation Convent, St. John’s, NL Canada
If you think composting and recycling are too much work for your household, come to Presentation motherhouse on Military Road where these women, many of whom are over 85 years old, are now sorting their waste into six streams.
Pictured here is Sister Catherine Burke as she scrapes food waste into a bin for composting.
The Presentation Sisters of Newfoundland and Labrador have continued to make a valuable contribution to our province’s communities ever since 1833 in education and various other ministries. Today, if you visited the Presentation motherhouse next to the Basilica, you would find approximately 45 sisters who are all still actively doing their part in so many ways.
Part of the evolving mission of the Presentation Sisters centers around care of the earth, which for them now also includes things like using natural cleaners, reducing energy usage, minimizing consumption, and reducing, reusing and recycling waste. Building on that mission, the sisters and staff have launched a new and improved composting and recycling program at the convent.
Our congregation is committed to caring for the earth
and that starts with the way we live.
The average age of the sisters at the convent is 80+, ranging in age from 70 to 106! Regardless of age, the sisters feel strongly about minimizing waste and recycling or reusing as much as possible so that future generations can also benefit from the earth’s limited resources.
Bins for collecting food waste, paper, mixed containers and beverage containers are located on every floor of the convent, including in the kitchen and dining room. A bin for hazardous waste, such as batteries and aerosols, is located on the first floor. Recyclables go to the Materials Recovery Facility at Robin Hood Bay, and food waste is collected by Avalon Recycling for Island Compost in Conception Bay South where it is mixed with other organic waste and turned into compost by farmer, Phil Coates.
A waste audit conducted by the MMSB showed that a large percent of the waste being generated at the convent was organic. When that waste goes to a landfill, it produces methane – a greenhouse gas that is very harmful to our earth. Given those results, the Sisters knew they needed to improve the way they were managing their waste.
With the work involved in launching the new program, in just over a month the sisters had an effective system in place that everyone understands, is deeply committed to and is able to actively participate in. It is the sisters’ hope that in minimizing their waste, and composting or recycling as much as they can, they can reduce their demand on the earth’s resources and turn waste back into materials that can be used again and again.
We all live in a busy world where convenience often seems to come above all else. By composting, we reduce methane and return vital nutrients back to the soil – nutrients that are needed for the soil to grow new food. We also save energy and water at the same time.
As a congregation, the Presentation Sisters continue to be a reminder to each other and to all of us that everything we buy, everything we consume, comes from somewhere and that it is our responsibility to be good stewards of the earth and its resources. The sisters at the motherhouse, with so many other people, have enthusiastically embraced the six waste streams as their new normal and model for us that others can, too. There are over 7 billion of us, but just one planet, and we all have a vital part to play.
October 1 marked National Senior’s Day in Canada as this piece was being written. Today, regardless of our age, we are all being continually challenged to waste less and recycle more so that future generations can also enjoy this one earth that faithfully provides us with so much.
To learn more about the NL Presentation Sisters, visit http://www.presentationsisters.ca