Friday 1st September is the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation: “Today (Pope Francis says) the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, offers to individual believers and to the community a precious opportunity to renew our personal participation in this vocation as custodians of creation, raising to God our thanks for the marvellous works that he has entrusted to our care, invoking his help for the protection of creation and his mercy for the sins committed against the world in which we live. The celebration of the Day on the same date as the Orthodox Church will be a valuable opportunity to bear witness to our growing communion with our Orthodox brothers and sisters. We live in a time where all Christians are faced with identical and important challenges and we must give common replies to those in order to appear more credible and effective.” This World Day of Prayer opens up the Season of Creation and the season finishes on the Feast of St. Francis on October 4th. Even though we should pray for the environment and the need to tackle climate change at all times, special effort is asked during this season. Pope Francis’ encyclical, ‘Laudato Si’ is considered to be one of the most comprehensive texts dealing with the question of taking care of creation and seeing all aspects of life responsible for ensuring that the world we share, and all of us and all God’s creatures, are too valuable to destroy.
Roman Catholic Diocese of Cloyne, County Cork, Ireland.
