Happehatchee Regional Conference | February 12-14, 2025

Location: Day Spring Episcopal Conference Center in Parrish, Florida

Pictured left: Day Spring’s beautiful outdoor chapel. 

WHAT WILL TAKE PLACE?

Caring for Creation is falling in love with the beauty and abundance of Mother Earth and knowing in our hearts we are part of Her.  She gives us everything we need to live a full, happy and meaningful life.  When we give back to Her in reciprocal relationships we thrive.

Companions and guests will gather in a sacred circle where we will learn about Native American and Celtic Worldview and become co-creators in Caring for Creation.  Guided by The Rev. Rachel Taber-Hamilton who draws from her First Nations Shackan heritage we will gain a deeper understanding of a worldview that is life-giving for all, replacing the dominant one that is killing us. Companion Eileen Clark and others from the Happehatchee Chapter will weave in our Celtic heritage.  

Mystical and religious music by Sr. Helena Marie, CHS, along with time for reflections, meditation, prayers, nature walks, creating nature art and poetry, and having meaningful conversations where everyone is listened to with respect will help us to transform our old ways of thinking and acting to ones that are life-giving for all creation.  

Click here to view the full agenda.

Vandana Shiva, international Indian environmentalist says:

“We are either going to have a future where women lead the way to make peace with the Earth 0r we are not going to have a human future at all.”

Ilya Prigogine, Nobel Prize in chemistry wrote:

“When a system is far from equilibrium, small islands of coherence have the capacity to shift the entire system.”

Join us in being part of the shift. There are three ways to participate.

Private Overnight Guestroom

$486 (includes program fee, two nights lodging, and meals.)

Shared Overnight Guestroom

$406 (includes program fee, two nights lodging, and meals.)

Commuter

Early bird rate: $291 (includes program fee and meals.)

MEET OUR FACILITATORS

Eileen D. Clark became a Companion in 1977. Her curiosity about Celtic and early British Christianity began in her teenage years after she depicted Saint Hilda in a diocesan pageant entitled “The Bringing of the Light to Britain”. A lifelong educator, she began teaching in the UK in 1957, before moving to the US and teaching in 1967, until her retirement in 2001. The revival of interest in the Celtic church in the mid-nineteenth century, the increase in scholarship and publication of Celtic prayers and poetry fed her enthusiasm on her path. In the mid-nineties her late husband began a series of Celtic carvings and crosses which she incorporates in her presentations. Eileen currently resides in Pompano Beach, Florida.

Sr. Helena Marie is a member of the Community of the Holy Spirit, an Episcopal religious community for women in New York.  Her work over the last 45 years has included teaching kindergarten, creating a program of retreats, concerts, art shows and poetry readings and traveling extensively as Associate Director of Women in Mission and Ministry.  She and Ann Smith co-authored WomenPrints: A Detailed Plan of Action for the New Millennium, the Women’s Round Calendar and co-produced Women’s Uncommon Prayers: Our Lives Revealed, Nurtured Created.  She created Bluestone Farm and Living Arts Center in Brewster, NY.  She and Sr. Claire Joy currently live in Woodstock, NY, making liturgy, art, music and community gardens with members of St. Gregory’s Episcopal Church. 

Ann Smith is Founder and Co-AC-in- C Happehatchee Chapter, Co-Founder and Convener of Green Tent Circle, Co-Convener of Millionth Circle and Trustee of the Parliament of World Religions serving on the Women and Climate Action Task Forces and Program Committee.  She is the past Director of Women in Mission and Ministry of the National Episcopal Church where she started the Council for Women’s Ministries, produced the Journal of Women’s Ministries magazine, created four women’s leadership programs, trained facilitators around the world, and hosted three international gatherings. Past Executive Director of Global Education Associates where Earth Child, the Millionth Circle, African and US, AFR-US AIDS Coalition, and Indigenous Women’s Pathways program had their beginning.  

The Rev. Rachel Taber-Hamilton is an Indigenous ordained priest in the Episcopal Church. As a Shackan First Nation person, she represents the Episcopal Church on the board of the Anglican Indigenous Network and was part of the project team for the Anglican Indigenous Network video series, “Prophetic Indigenous Voices on the Planetary Crisis.” She served on the Episcopal Church delegation to the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues and on the Presiding Bishop’s delegation to United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP26 and COP28). She has written articles addressing Indigenous concerns for the Anglican Theological Journal that include “The Necessity of Native American Autonomy for Successful Partnerships” (1994) and “When Creation is Sacred” (2021). She maintains her blog, Greening Spirit (www.greeningspirit.com), addressing environmental issues and social justice concerns towards renewing human relationships with creation and with one another. Rachel is currently the Rector of Trinity Episcopal Church in Everett, WA and serves as the Vice President of the House of Deputies of the Episcopal Church General Convention.