03 Sep – The Evolution of Love

Sometimes it can be quite depressing when you realise how few people have actually heard of Laudato Si. The fact that it is rarely heard about from the pulpit is also distressing.  Yet, the background to taking action on our Climate crisis is a wonderfully positive ‘creation theology’.

The title of this piece is the title of our next Day of Reflection. It is focused on an exploration of Creation Theology and spirituality. It is creation-centred spirituality that invites us to recognise our role within the ongoing evolution of the universe. Do we see ourselves as planetary beings, the latest expression of God’s continuing creation story?

What does this mean for how we relate to our world – our ‘Common Home’? How can we nurture its flourishing rather than its destruction.

As a Commission we are always mindful of the need to balance prayer, reflection and action. Our climate crisis is one on which many supporters of the Commission continue to take action. It is so easy to get sucked into doing more and more action in the hope of changing the injustices of this world. Conversely, it is also easy to get sucked into closeting yourself away from other people and just praying that the climate crisis will get better. 

Since the publication of Pope Francis’ Laudato Si we have worked hard to balance out the need to raise awareness of the issues around the climate crisis and encouraged people to take part in events such as mass lobbies of Parliament. During Covid lockdowns we held more than one prayer and reflection session about the Climate Crisis and some of our previous Days of Reflection have taken our relationship with creation as a theme.

This particular Day of Reflection will offer insights from cosmology, theology and church teaching. But as well as some inputs there will be interactive workshops offering everyone who comes to the day an opportunity to deepen understanding, re-focus energies, generate hope and inspire shared action.

We are delighted that leading us in this exploration will be the ‘Begin with the Heart’ team. This is a group of people who are carrying on the work of spreading and developing the insights of Fr Donal O’Leary of the Leeds Diocese, who died in 2019. He was a prolific writer and the team will only be able to scratch the surface of his work during this day. However, if you want to find out more about his thinking and see what this day might be like, then you can visit the website dedicated to his reflections: www.astonishingsecret.org