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The Alaska Vegetarian Society (AVS) is critical to a movement that is dramatically changing people's lives. In the midst of America's health care crisis and obesity epidemic, it's tremendously exciting and empowering to know we can turn it around through making personal changes in our own diet. Not only can we improve our own health; we make it easier for others to follow suit.
Read about Joy Santos, who overcame the prison of food addiction or Regina Montgomery, who is now free of the incapacitating pain of rheumatoid arthritis. These are just two of the hundreds of Alaskan lives that have been changed, and sometimes actually saved, by a shift to a plant-based diet. People with Type 2 Diabetes have reversed this disease, reducing and sometimes eliminating all medications. Others have helped put their cancer into remission. Many others have reversed their heart disease, lowering their cholesterol and blood pressure and losing excess weight. And everyone experiences more energy and vitality after shifting to a healthy, plant-based diet.
AVS supports these dietary changes in many ways:
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- Monthly potlucks: These events provide significant support for anyone wanting to change their diet. Meeting monthly with others on the same journey makes us realize we aren’t alone. It also offers us a chance to eat EVERYTHING on the tables without worrying about it containing ingredients we wish to avoid, such as chicken broth in the soup, cheese in the casserole, or bacon in the salad. We get new ideas and new recipes from sampling the dishes brought by others. It’s also a great way to introduce our friends and family to the wide variety of delicious plant-based foods.
We also enjoy a short cooking demonstration and an educational program
at each potluck. Nutritional information is always evolving, and we try
to provide the latest and best information available. We have books
and videos for sale, as well as free hand-outs and a video lending
library. To add to the fun, we have drawings and door prizes. We benefit
from the enthusiasm and passion of others and go away feeling
energized!
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- Monthly Newsletter: We provide a free colorful, educational, and inspirational newsletter every month, both in paper form as well as on our website. It includes someone's incredibly inspiring personal story, a recipe, nutritional information, a calendar of upcoming events, and a headline article offering a variety of different perspectives on how choosing a plant-based diet fits into a healthy lifestyle and healthy world.
- Classes: AVS helps support the Food for Life Nutrition and Cooking Classes offered in Anchorage and the Valley. We provide free newsletters and other hand-outs to class members. We provide the traveling bookstore. We also offer a scholarship fund to help those who cannot pay the full registration fee for classes. And new vegetarians can then receive regular support at our monthly potlucks.
- Cookbook: AVS compiled a cookbook entitled Cooking With Compassion which is a favorite among many of our members and class attendees. We're in the planning stages of writing another cookbook.
- Film Night & Public documentary showings: In our commitment to education, we have a monthly AVS Film Night, where we show films not typically found at BlockBuster or NetFlix on a wide range of topics. Occasionally, we also offer public showings of a variety of documentaries. Past videos include: Food, Inc., Processed People, A Delicate Balance, and Peaceable Kingdom.
- Vegan Thanksgiving Dinner: Where else can you enjoy a completely vegan, totally delicious feast on Thanksgiving Day? The program after dinner includes music and a nature video.
- Members receive a free subscription to VegNews. This magazine is totally vegan. It includes recipes, articles, travel information, and lots of other helpful information.
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With all these things already in place, it’s probably hard to imagine the effort and expense involved in providing them. It has taken many hours of dedicated work as well as money to get us where we are now, and it continues to take time and money to provide these services as well as expand them.
If you can see the value of being part of an organization that has dramatically changed so many lives in Alaska, as well as touching countless lives in our collective web of influence, we ask you to join us by becoming a member.
Benefits of membership include receiving 10% off the cost of books and videos in our bookstore, reduced fees at our potluck dinners, as well as a free subscription to VegNews, valued at $20/year. But more importantly, you receive the satisfaction of knowing you’re helping save lives by supporting the ongoing education of individuals, groups, and the public. You’re also helping raise awareness of our personal contribution to a healthier, more sustainable, more compassionate world through the adoption of a plant-based diet.
Please consider making a recurring monthly donation, by becoming a Pledge Member. This option helps assure we will have enough funds to continue our work though-out the year. All donations are tax deductible.
Click the Memberships button to see all of the options.
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