Margaret Renkl

Environmental Stewardship

September 20, 2025, 5:00 p.m.

Margaret Renkl is one of the most graceful and powerful authors on our relationship with the natural world working today. She is the author of The Comfort of Crows: A Backyard Year, which won the 2024 Southern Book Prize. Her other works include Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss and Graceland, At Last: Notes on Hope and Heartache From the American South, both of which have won several environmental and literary awards. Since 2017, Renkl has served as a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, where her essays appear on the first and third Mondays of the month.

Her voice is the perfect match to help us recognize and cherish the beauty of God’s world and take steps to address the issues that threaten our communities, such as climate change and sea level rise. Norfolk has the highest sea level rise on the East Coast, a distinction which is no surprise to residents of Hampton Roads. Margaret is someone who has thought deeply about our human relationship with the natural world and has expressed those thoughts in beautiful and inspiring ways that will help inspire change.

The Conversation Continues

Since the goal of the Jim Sell Community Conversation is to spark conversations within our broader community, we’ve made this year’s theme of Environmental Stewardship a major part of our Fall formation series.

During our Sunday Adult Forum, we are going to take a good, hard look at the realities of our relationship with creation with the goal of seeking out ways to take action and respond to the human caused problems we experience. This is something we know from our Holy Listening conversations is of import to this parish, it is also a core component of our Bishop’s initiatives, and is central to the teaching of The Episcopal Church.

During this series, you will hear from the clergy reflecting theologically on this issue and from special guests who are leaders in the field of environmentalism in this area. All in the hopes that we will be inspired to take further and more meaningful action in support of this fragile earth, our island home. Please take note of these conversations below:

September 21: A Theology of Creation (part 1)
September 28: A Theology of Creation (part 2)
October 5: Composting with CSL’s Caring for Creation team
October 12: From the Front Lines: a panel featuring Wetlands Watch, The Elizabeth River Project, The Chesapeake Bay Foundation, and Lynnhaven River Now
October 19: Norfolk Botanical Gardens: a special presentation on The Garden of Tomorrow
October 26: What then shall we do? A Wrap-up Conversation

Want to continue the conversation? Fill out the info below, and we'll keep you updated as we continue to engage these important issues.

We will only contact you about future opportunities specifically related to Jim Sell Community Conversation events, including this year's event with Margaret Renkl. We are not adding you to our church mailing list. If you'd like to receive regular updates from Christ & St. Luke's as well, you can let us know that here.

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What is the Jim Sell Community Conversation?

Jim Sell served as Rector of Christ & St. Luke’s from 1990 to 2005. This service was bookended by his earlier work with Episcopal communities in West Virginia and New Jersey in the 1970s and 1980s and his “retirement” career as an interim rector, consultant, and mentor at parishes in Maryland, New Jersey, Connecticut, and back home in Virginia.

Jim lived a long, full life that was enriched by the people in his “community.” This included his family, friends, colleagues, and parishioners, as well as neighbors, community leaders, and really anyone else with whom he may have crossed paths. On the eve of his 80th birthday, he passed away peacefully in his sleep. Earlier in the day, he shared his reasons for being an Episcopalian. You can read the full document here.

“I rely on my fellow worshipers to honor me with their tolerance, kindness and generosity of spirit. I trust that they are engaging in the same interior dialogue with God that I am. We may end up with different answers to our most pivotal questions and, surprise of surprises, we can affirm the validity of all of our quests.”

How to Donate

Mission

The Jim Sell Community Conversations Fund supports Jim’s legacy of tolerance, kindness and generosity of spirit. It seeks to empower our community, in the broadest sense, to engage in meaningful, productive conversations that will inspire us to be the best version of ourselves. We are intentionally using the word “community” to embrace the Christ & St. Luke’s congregation, the city of Norfolk, and beyond. Like Jim, our hope is that these inclusive conversations will bring together people, ideas, cultures, and religions from varying viewpoints and yield learning, empathy, courage, and positive community action. We believe in the idea that small actions can have large effects, and so we hope that these community conversations inspire other conversations to flourish. All are invited to the table, to sit together, to learn from one another, and to “go forth into the world, rejoicing in the power of the Spirit.”

Click here to purchase a copy of Jim Sell’s memoir, Learning to Live.

Your Invitation to Join the Conversation

In honor of Jim Sell’s memory, we invite you to join the conversation and share in bringing this mission to life. Please consider making a tax-deductible contribution to this fund. You can give online here. You will need to select Jim Sell Community Conversations Fund from the drop down menu (see the image below).

A check can also be mailed to Christ & St. Luke’s Episcopal Church, 560 W. Olney Road, Norfolk, VA, 23507 and include “Jim Sell Community Conversations Fund” in the memo line.

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