Protect & heal God’s creation

The Season of Creation begins on September 1, the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation and ends on October 4, the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of ecology beloved by many Christian denominations. Throughout the month-long celebration, we come together in an annual ecumenical celebration of prayer and action for our common home.

The Season of Creation is a time to renew our relationship with our Creator and all creation through celebration, conversion, and commitment together. During the Season of Creation, we join our sisters and brothers in the ecumenical family in prayer and action for our common home.

An invitation 

Individuals and communities are invited to participate through prayer, sustainability projects and advocacy.

• Prayer: Host an ecumenical prayer gathering that unites all Christians for the care of our common home. One option is to host an interactive Feast of St. Francis program, found annually at catholicclimatecovenant.org
• Sustainability: Lead a clean-up or carbon-reduction project that helps all of creation thrive (such as improving energy efficiency).
• Advocacy: Raise your voice for climate justice by participating in or leading an ongoing campaign that supports our common home.

Often, when we speak of creation, it is related to nature, animals, landscapes, the sun, the moon, but we are also aware that the human being is the culmination of our Father’s creative work, “God saw all he had made, and indeed it was very good.” (Gen 1:31), the Sacred Scripture states.

As Pope Francis wrote in Laudato Si’, “‘Everyone’s talents and involvement are needed to redress the damage caused by human abuse of God’s creation’. All of us can cooperate as instruments of God for the care of creation, each according to his or her own culture, experience, involvements and talents.” (LS 14).

Commitment to Protect & Heal God’s Creation

We have come to renew our covenant with God and
with one another in Christ Jesus, our Lord.
We have come to help protect God’s creation.

We have come as followers of Jesus to commit
ourselves anew to one another and to heal
injustice and poverty.

We have come to stand together against all threats
to life.

We have come to discover some new beauty every
day in God’s creation: the sunrise and sunset,
birds, flowers and trees, rainbows in the sky, the
stars, the many forms of life in the forest.

We have come to listen to the “music of the
universe”- water flowing over rocks, the wind, trees
bending in the wind, raindrops pattering the roof.

We will remember always that God speaks to us
through the beauty of his creation, and we will
try our best to answer God’s call to reverence all that
he has created.

– From Prayers on the Care of Creation, USCCB

Getting active 

You can download a wonderful Season of Creation Calendar with suggested practical actions for each day of the ‘Season of Creation’ month Season of creation calendar pdf

Sister Kathleen Storms, a School Sister of Notre Dame, is a member of the team who wrote the calendar.  Kathleen hopes that this calendar of prayers and suggestions for action during the upcoming worldwide Season of Creation will help people “understand that simple options can make an important difference in our care for creation.”

The internationally recognized Season of Creation was proclaimed in 1989 for Eastern Orthodox Christians by the late Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios I of Constantinople.

In 2015, Pope Francis encouraged Catholics to welcome the season, the same year the pope wrote his encyclical on faith and the environment, “Laudato Si’, on Care for Our Common Home.”

In his encyclical, Pope Francis calls on people to address pollution, waste and misuse of natural resources. He promotes “integral ecology,” that is, a realization that all things in the natural world are connected, and everyone has a responsibility to promote a healthful planet.

Some useful links and resources:

The text for this article comes from a special prayer piece and image offered by Catholic Climate Covenant see pdf – ‘What is Season of Creation?’ flier what_is_SoC

See link for details on accessing a new liturgical banner and graphics prepared as part of ‘Care for Creation Resources’   HERE

And also Season of Creation 2022 | Catholic Climate Covenant

See Listen to the voice of creation – Presentation Sisters Union North East Ireland (presentationsistersne.ie)

(Note: The banner image to this post is created from the detail in the #SeasonOfCreation Banner and Logo for 2022).