Chris Newsam – Current Chair of Trustees

Chris has been associated with GreenSpirit for more than a decade and a Council Member for over five years. He has many eclectic interests including being an active Quaker, an Interfaith Minister, Storytelling, a Pacifist with a growing deep-seated love of the Earth. An activist with an interest in liberal and progressive politics.

Alongside his wife Janice, also a Council Member, he has been instrumental in running a local GreenSpirit group which focuses on celebrating the Celtic Festivals. Currently living in North Yorkshire, Chris particularly enjoys exploring the Yorkshire coast and moors.

Chris’ passion is to help widen the appeal, knowledge and appreciation for the natural environment and to foster greater diversity in age and background of GreenSpirit membership. His work background includes charity management and fundraising, running an animal care facility and marketing and business management.

Janice Every joins the Council bringing a wealth of charity management experience. Her work has taken her from an early career in publishing, through school administration while her children were young, to enjoying managing one of the largest complementary health and education centres in England, and latterly, onto developing and expanding the role of Chief Officer of a regional charity supporting people with sight impairment. If asked, she would describe herself as a person-centred manager, getting things done by respecting others’ skills and abilities. Janice is also a psychotherapist, and is just completing her training as a spiritual healer.

She has developed her love and passion for the Earth and for protecting the environment over many decades, and has been associated with GreenSpirit for over ten years. Janice, alongside her husband, helped to found a local GreenSpirit group, ‘Ryedale and North Yorkshire Coast’, which has enjoyed celebrating the festivals of the Celtic calendar over the past few years. She considers the work of GreenSpirit as integral to her own spirituality, with its emphasis on celebrating the awe and beauty of living on our unique planet. Janice has also been a Quaker for many years.

Employing her existing skills and experience, she looks forward to learning new ones and taking on new challenges in what she considers her ‘new adventure’ serving on Council and helping to inspire the membership and beyond.

Chris Holmes’s conversion to a green ethos was gradual but thorough. He worked for nearly three decades in the financial markets, and as Director of a large City institution was instrumental in the introduction and development of ‘green’ investment funds – one of the few activities he feels good about during this period! Since leaving the financial sector in the mid-1990s he has spent his time in voluntary work and developing a range of eco-related interests.

His hobbies include walking, running, tennis, playing guitar, the Christian contemplative tradition and retreat movement, local history and the poetry of John Clare. Chris is married to Jill, also a ‘greenspiriter’, and lives in Surrey. He has been involved with GreenSpirit for 25 years and on the Council for most of that time. He says: “It is home for me emotionally, intellectually and spiritually. I feel blessed to be part of this movement.” He is also involved with the Green Party, Garden Organic, the John Clare Society, the Thomas Merton Society among others.

Liz Beaven: I have been a member of GreenSpirit for several years and joined the Southampton group when it was originally led by Chris and Isobel Clarke. I had been on my own spiritual quest for authenticity for some decades, starting with a more fundamentalist and evangelical approach which I found increasingly restrictive. I could not sit comfortably with the doctrines and lack of inclusivity, so it was a great relief to find GreenSpirit which resonated with me on so many levels. I have always been a lover of Nature and the landscape and spent many summers up in Cumbria plus the Lancashire and Yorkshire moors as a child. The Romantic poets spoke truth to me in their celebration of the natural world and the sacredness of the Earth.

I have two grown-up children, a boy, and a girl and now four small grandsons, who keep me very busy, including an eight-month-old baby.

My career has been mainly within teaching both in English literature and in a specialist teacher role for children and adults with dyslexia and other specific difficulties, which I have done for many years. I’m also involved in some community work with people with mild dementia and I also assist with parenting groups and some family work. This is through a local charity connected with the URC church. I’m also a member of the Unitarian Church in Southampton which is low on numbers. I run the Southampton GreenSpirit Local Group which meets at the church premises, and they are very happy to work with us. I am keen to do whatever I am able to help the environment so that this beautiful Earth can thrive.

PIERS WARREN

Piers is an author, conservationist, film-maker, activist, cook and veganic veg-grower living in the UK.

Ian Mowll is GreenSpirit’s Coordinator and many people’s first point of contact with the organization. It is a role that he loves. Ian’s career started with computing in the financial markets, followed by charity/social enterprise work and now he is more and more involved in spiritual development.

Some of the things he loves to do are: cooking, storytelling, 5 rhythms dancing and having ideas. He lives in Stratford, East London.

Ian has been involved in GreenSpirit since 1999 and sees it as his spiritual home. He says: “Finding GreenSpirit was the first time I found somewhere where I truly felt I could be spiritually ‘me’ without having to pretend. When joining GreenSpirit, occasionally people use the phrase ‘welcome home’ – a phrase that feels good to me.” He is also involved with the OneSpirit Interfaith Foundation and is an independent celebrant.