As summer wanes and the harvest season begins throughout the northern hemisphere, Christians worldwide observe the Season of Creation, which commences on the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation on 1 September and ends on the feast of St. Franci of Assisi, 4 October. During this period, Christians are reminded “that our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us,” Pope Francis wrote in his 2015 encyclical, “Laudato si’.”
However, “this sister now cries out to us,” the pope continued, “because of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her. We have come to see ourselves as her lords and masters, entitled to plunder her at will. The violence present in our hearts, wounded by sin, is also reflected in the symptoms of sickness evident in the soil, in the water, in the air and in all forms of life.
“This is why the earth herself, burdened and laid waste, is among the most abandoned and maltreated of our poor; she ‘groans in travail’ (Rom 8:22). We have forgotten that we ourselves are dust of the earth (cf. Gen 2:7); our very bodies are made up of her elements, we breathe her air and we receive life and refreshment from her waters.”
While the harm that humanity has inflicted on her in the center of our world as believers in the one God, the Holy Land, is particularly egregious — for those lands are the very lands where “the Word was made flesh and dwelt among us” (Jn 1:14) — this devastation of the earth is global. And the consequences of what we have wrought impact us all, from the unpredictable fallout of climate change to mass migration and the forced displacement of humanity.
During this season, CNEWA will feature stories on its blog from throughout the Middle East, Northeast Africa, India and Eastern Europe. These will report on the ecological and environmental circumstances there, the impact of these conditions on the lives of families — especially the most vulnerable — and how the church is responding.
It’s not all bad news!
Thanks to the generosity of CNEWA’s generous friends and benefactors, there’s always reason for hope, as examples of sheer grit, perseverance, fortitude and determination abound.
“We come together to take charge of this home that has been entrusted to us,” concluded Pope Francis in his encyclical, “knowing that all the good that exists here will be taken up into the heavenly feast.
“In union with all creatures, we journey through this land seeking God, for ‘if the world has a beginning and if it has been created, we must enquire who gave it this beginning, and who was its Creator’ [from a homily by St. Basil the Great].
“Let us sing as we go. May our struggles and our concern for this planet never take away the joy of our hope.” Amen.