Ten years ago today On the 24th May Pope Francis signed his historic encyclical Laudato Si, an open letter to everyone in the world about our Care for Creation.
In this letter, he crystallised the wisdom of many previous Popes and other great Catholic minds, all the way back to St Francis’ Canticle of Creation in 1224.
Laudato Si shows us the interconnectedness of the challenges facing humanity today, how economic systems and over extraction of the earths resources are driving ever greater economic inequality, poverty, social fragmentation, pollution and environmental breakdown.
However, Laudato Si is not just a list of insurmountable challenges. In it Pope Francis reaffirms his confidence in our global Catholic and other faith communities to act from a place of great hope in our hearts and that we have strength in our communities and the Church’s influence across many countries.
From this document the Laudato Si movement was born, a global Catholic community joining together across continents, learning from each other how to rise to these challenges with strength and grace in our actions and hope and love for creation in our hearts.
To celebrate this ten year anniversary we are running a short series of sessions (3 sessions, fortnightly over 6wks) on Tuesday evenings from 7pm-8.30 Starting on June 10th here at St Mary Star of the Sea.
It’s a very gentle introduction to Laudato Si, exploring together what Pope Francis’ message means to each of us as individuals, in our own church and local communities and how that can bring about positive change more widely.
St Mary Star of the Sea Catholic Church Hastings 