USCCB: God calls us to be good stewards of creation

September 02, 2016

Archbishop Thomas Wenski, chairman of the US bishops’ Committee on Domestic Justice and Human Development, and Bishop Oscar Cantú, chairman of the Committee on International Justice and Peace, issued a statement on September 1, the World Day of Prayer for Care of Creation.

“In his encyclical, Laudato si’, Pope Francis called us to live out an ‘integral ecology,’ which in simple terms means having right relationships with God, other human beings and the good things of the Earth,” the prelates wrote. “When one relationship suffers, all the others will suffer as well.”

“The foundational relationship in our lives is the one with God, who invites us to turn to him in daily prayer,” they added, as they repeated the Pope’s call to a simplicity of life rooted in Christ.

Calling for an “attitude of stewardship, forged in daily life,” the bishops said that “as we expand our work together as good stewards, it must be marked by care and respect for the dignity of every human being, especially the poor.”

In a separate statement, Archbishop Joseph Kurtz, the president of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, welcomed Pope Francis’s message for the day.

 

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Further information:

• Statement on the World Day of Prayer for Care of Creation (USCCB)
• Pope Francis Invites Us to “Show Mercy to our Common Home” (USCCB)
• Environmentalism is a corporal and spiritual work of mercy, Pope proclaims (CWN, 9/1)