Lettera Madre 1 september 2015

My dear Sisters …

My dear Sisters,

During the Papal Audience on 26 August, Pope Francis announced that the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation is to be celebrated on 1 Sept. He stated: “In communion of prayer with our Orthodox brothers and with all good persons of good will, we wish to make our contribution to the surmounting of the ecological crisis that humanity is experiencing. Throughout the world, various ecclesial realities have planned appropriate initiatives of prayer and reflection, to make this Day an intense moment, also in view of changing to coherent life-styles”.

In a letter for 6 August Pope Francis had already declared: “The annual World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation will offer individual believers and communities a fitting opportunity to reaffirm their personal vocation to be stewards of creation, to thank God for the wonderful handiwork which he has entrusted to our care, and to implore his help for the protection of creation as well as his pardon for the sins committed against the world in which we live”.

In this respect let us look again at the letter I sentlast year(29 Sept 2014) in particular at two points: ‘The Pope tackles sustainability’ and ‘What else can we do?’ This callson all of us ‘to take personal responsibility and redirect our relationship with nature’. We are invited to this: “Let us protect Christ in our lives, so that we can protect others, so that we can protect creation!”. We are recommended to be in communion with the whole Church using the text of the Encyclical “Laudato Si”, for personal and community reflection – making our own the prayer at the end.

We give thanks to God for a wonderful visit to Tanzania where there are many joyful signs of new life among the Sisters in each community, together with real ‘care’ for every little piece of our God given earth.

A very happy feast of Madonna delle Grazieto each Sister in the Italian District as we celebrate ‘Day of Community’!

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