Each year from September 1st to October 4th, Christians around the world come together to celebrate the Season of Creation. We come together in prayer and action to protect our common home. We come together to celebrate God as Creator, and our identity as co-creatures and part of all that God has made. We remember our well-being is interwoven with the well-being of the Earth, and we renew our commitment to love and care for the gift of all that is created.
This year, the theme is Living Water, taken from the imagery of Ez 47:9,12 and inspired by the line, “Wherever the river flows, every creature will live”. Bishop Wallace Podgett describes it as “a powerful vision of ecological restoration and hope set amid exile and loss”. The imagery of ecological conversion is so rich that we will linger in the water, spending September immersed in the first 12 verses of Ezekiel 57. Let the living waters flow!
You embrace with your tenderness all that exists.
Pour out upon us the power of your love,
that we may protect life and beauty…
Teach us to discover the worth of each thing,
to be filled with awe and contemplation,
to recognize that we are profoundly united
with every creature…
Encourage us, we pray, in our struggle
for justice, love and peace.
-Pope Francis, Laudato Si’, 2015
Blessings, Anne