ACBC Reflection for Laudato Si’ Week – Day One

16 May 2022
Image: ACBC/Supplied

 

Laudato Si’ Week, a celebration of Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si’ and a call to action for Catholics around the world, is being celebrated 16-24 May, 2022.

Throughout Laudato Si’ Week, you and your community are encouraged to join us in reflecting and acting to bring Laudato Si’ to life. 


Welcome to Laudato Si’ Week 2022!

 

From the Encyclical:

“The urgent challenge to protect our common home includes a concern to bring the whole human family together … for we know that things can change.” Laudato Si’ n.13.

 

For Reflection

“Behold, I make all things new!” (Revelation, 21:5)

The essence of our Easter season was proclaimed joyfully in yesterday’s Eucharist. The invitation from Pope Francis in the week ahead is to integrate the affirmations and challenges of the encyclical Laudato Si’ and the Laudato Si’ Action Platform that was launched last year.

Whether you are an artist or activist, economist or educator, parishioner or parent, student or seeker, the encyclical and Action Platform provide a realistic yet hope-filled invitation ‘for a new dialogue about how we are shaping the future of our planet’ (LS n 14). Pope Francis’ emphasis on dialogue and discernment, inclusivity and intellectual rigour models a heartfelt desire to engage with all: ‘I would like to enter into dialogue with all people about our common home’ (LS n 3).

Laudato Si’ is not simply a manifesto on climate change. It offers a new vision of the world as glorious as the vision in Revelation of ‘a new heaven and a new earth’ (Rev 21:1).

Laudato Si’ Week calls us to be Easter people, acknowledging the dark places in ourselves, our families, neighbourhoods, nation, and wider world, while praying and planning for a more peaceful and interconnected world.

Inspired by the Vatican Dicastery for Integral Human Development, the Australian Bishops’ Office for Justice, Ecology and Peace invites families, parishes, dioceses, educational institutions, the healthcare sector, businesses, and religious orders on a seven-year journey toward integral ecology. This requires an integrated approach.

Therefore, we commend prayer, refection, study, dialogue, and action across Laudato Si’ Week. ‘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 n 14)

 

Prayer

Gracious God, you are good to all and compassionate to all your works.

As we commence Laudato Si’ Week: we are mindful of your generous love in all creation,

we acknowledge the traditional owners of the land on which we live,

we accept your invitation to engage with the wisdom of Laudato Si’ .

With Pope Francis, concerned citizens and all creation,

we commit to the call and challenge of the week ahead,

so that, in prayer and protest, silence and song, reflection and renewal, we might live the Easter promise of love’s triumph.

We make this prayer in the name of Jesus, our risen Lord, through the power of the Holy Spirit, now and forever.

Amen.

 

Action

Head: Check the websites: laudatosi.org and laudatosiactioplatform.org to engage with Pope Francis’ vision of integral ecology.

Heart: Pray each day using the prayers from these daily prayer and reflection sheets.

Hands: Highlight Laudato Si’ Week in your own context e.g., parish or school bulletin, prayer at a work meeting or faith sharing group, display a poster on your workplace’s reception desk, display quotes from Laudato Si’ on noticeboards.

 

In the Diocese of Parramatta, Bishop Vincent Long OFM Conv, Bishop of Parramatta invites all parishes, schools, organisations and families to respond to his invitation to take action on the care of our common home. See the video about this project and find out more here. 

With thanks to the Australian Catholic Bishops Conference’s Office for Justice, Ecology and Peace.

 

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