Papal preacher: man’s sovereignty over creation is for glorifying God
September 02, 2016
Pope Francis presided at Vespers in St. Peter’s Basilica on September 1, the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation.
“There is almost a competition among non-believing scientists as to who will go the farthest in affirming the total marginality and insignificance of human beings in the universe,” Father Raniero Cantalamessa, the preacher of the Papal Household, said during his homily.
Affirming man’s special place in creation, Father Cantalamessa preached that being created in the image of God entails a call to “being in communion.” Thus, “the sovereignty of human beings over the cosmos thus does not entail the triumphalism of our species but the assumption of responsibility toward the weak, the poor, the defenseless.”
Father Cantalamessa added:
There are many duties that human beings have concerning creation, some more urgent than others: water, air, climate, energy, protecting the species at risk, etc. People speak of these issues in all the venues and meetings that deal with ecology.
There is, however, a duty to creation that we cannot speak about except in a meeting of believers, and it is absolutely appropriate that it therefore be placed front and center during the present moment of prayer. That duty is doxology, glorifying God for creation. An ecology without a doxology makes the universe opaque, like an immense glass map of the world that is without the light that should illuminate it from within.
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