Sister Kathleen Storms hopes a 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.”
Meatless Mondays and shopping at farmer’s markets are among actions proposed by the Care for Creation Team of which Sister Kathleen, a School Sister of Notre Dame, is a member.
She said she has studied resources on Catholic social teaching and ecology provided through the Catholic Climate Covenant, which was formed in 2006 by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops with partners including Catholic Relief Services, Catholic Charities USA and St. Paul-based Catholic Rural Life. She worked on the calendar for about three weeks.
“My best creative time is in the morning,” said Sister Kathleen, whose ministry since the 1990s has centered on environmental education. “It was a very prayerful experience,” she told The Catholic Spirit, the archdiocesan newspaper.
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.
The season starts Sept. 1 with the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation and closes with the feast of St. Francis of Assisi, Oct. 4.
Sister Kathleen created a calendar that takes this year’s Season of Creation theme, “Listen to the Voice of Creation,” and logo, the burning bush of Exodus 3:1-12, and includes suggestions for each day, such as pastors introducing the season to parishioners at Sunday Masses Sept. 4.
Suggestions for Sept. 6 are using cloth bags instead of single-use plastic and declining to use a straw when drinking a beverage. Sept. 29 recognizes the feast of the Archangels Sts. Michael, Gabriel and Raphael, while urging people to join an environmental group to help protect the earth.
Copies of the calendar can be requested at creation@archspm.org.
