Diocese of Hallam
Pastoral Letter
To be read at all Masses on the weekend of 7/8 September 2024
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
On 1 September, we embarked on another Season of Creation, concluding 4 October, on the Feast of St Francis, Patron of Ecology and a much loved Saint in the Church.
The Season of Creation is a season dedicated to prayer, reflection and celebration of God as Creator. It invites people of faith and none to reflect prayerfully on the gifts of creation, and the mission given to us by God, to care for creation and to respond to its needs and crises today.
In his book, The Practice of the Love of Jesus Christ, written in 1768, St Alphonsus, the Founder of the Redemptorists, speaks of four outpourings of God’s love on the world: the Incarnation, the Passion, and the Eucharist. However, he says that the first outpouring of God’s love on the world is in the gift of creation.
Alphonsus is no “Eco Warrior“! However, I believe he has something that is both simple and profound to say about our relationship with our Creator and our world. He writes:
“Seeing that humans are driven by kindness, God willed to use his gifts to win them over to his love. ‘I led them with cords of kindness with bands of love. (Hos11:4) I want to draw all men and women to love me with those snares of love, by which they are caught, that is by the snares of love, and those have precisely been God’s gifts to human beings. After having given us souls with powers after his own image, with memory, understanding and will, and bodies furnished with their senses, he created for us heaven and earth, and so many other things, all for the love of us – the sky, the stars, the planets, the seas, the rivers, the springs, the mountains, the plains, metals, fruits and countless species of animals: and all these creatures were made to serve the human race, so that men and women might love him in gratitude for so many gifts”.
Our Christian responsibility for the planet begins with an appreciation of everything that he made, and it was very good. (Gen.1: 31) We gather today to celebrate our great prayer of thanksgiving to express our profound thanks to God for the gift of his creation to each of us by name, as an expression of his love for the world and for each of us.
However, as we look around our world, we quickly become aware that our actions have not always expressed our gratitude for God’s many gifts, and the effects of our lack of gratitude on our world are clearly seen. As a result, in recent years, we have experienced increased incidence of wildfire, flooding and other natural disasters across the globe, the rise of sea levels, and the warming of the planet.
The result of this is what scientists speak of as tipping points in the earth’s system that, once reached, will make it difficult to find our way back from. And these, we are constantly reminded, are not far away.
We cling to the hope and expectation for a better world. However, we cling to the hope for a better world, striving for a new life amidst the struggles.
The good news, however, is that we can change course, believing that the worst effects of climate change can still be avoided.
Reflecting on this year’s theme “To hope and Act with Creation”, one of the pieces of resource material offers the following …
As stewards of this planet, the call to hope is a beacon guiding us towards a future of sustainability, balance and harmony with nature. It invites us to envision a world where the beauty of Creation is preserved for generations to come, where ecosystems flourish, and where every living being finds its place in the delicate web of life.
Yours sincerely in Christ, the Redeemer,
