Being a faithful steward of creation

Pope Leo XIV celebrated the first ‘Mass for the Care of Creation’ on July 9 in Castel Gandolfo, using a new formulary of the Roman Missal. The new formulary was produced by the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development and the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments.

The  formulary provides a way in which, in the words of Cardinal Michael Czerny, Prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, “the Church is offering liturgical, spiritual and communal support for the care we all need to exercise of nature, our common home.” We are called to be “faithful stewards of what God has entrusted to us …”

In this week’s Gospel (Luke 10:25-37), our interdependence as global neighbours is clear. It is in seeking and promoting the wellbeing of others that we promote our own.

Indeed, we come to recognise that as children of God and stewards of His creation, we are entrusted with all that He has given to us: the earth, the oceans and the creatures of the air, the land, and the sea.

The ferocity of recent natural disasters has been attributed to global warming.  Wildfires in Australia, the USA, and  parts of Europe have consumed not just properties, but  have laid waste to forests upon which we depend for life in one way or another.

Flooding in Pakistan, Brazil and Texas has destroyed lives and livelihoods, while oil spills in Nigeria have turned arable land into wasteland.

Rivers, oceans, lakes, groundwater, and aquifers across both the developed and developing world have become dumping grounds for toxic chemicals, including benzene.

Lead, arsenic, chemical effluents, untreated sewage, millions of abandoned vessels and industrial waste in our seas and waterways endanger not only human life, but also  the lives of whales, fish, sea birds, sea turtles and other marine and land-based animals.

The uncontrolled growth of algae, caused by contamination from fertilisers, clogs water filters and destroys marine life—undeniable evidence of which we see in the Caroni area.

Our very drinking water can no longer be classified as pure, and diseases such as diarrhoea, parasitosis, cholera and hepatitis abound in heavily polluted areas.

In severely affected countries, babies are born with deformities and respiratory illnesses, and life expectancy is low. When nuclear disasters occur, pollutants in the water cause a rise in thyroid and other cancers.

The burning of coal and other fossil fuels has been proven disastrous to our health and to the environment. The move to clean energy has become mandatory. An insistence on “dirty fuels” imposes a sentence of suffering and devastation. It is, simply put, a matter of life and death.

Every one of us has the right to a healthy environment as a fundamental human right. Yet we forfeit that right by our short-sightedness and wilful ignorance, and by allowing greed to dictate our decisions and our actions.

This country cannot escape the consequences of our own poor decisions—on both a personal and communal level. The rainy season now seems to bring inevitable flooding. Crops are destroyed; streets, homes and public buildings are filled with angry, swirling and disease-filled water; cars are swept away; and productivity in the workplace suffers. Schools near watercourses are not spared, and the blame game intensifies.

We have all seen the piles of garbage that clog our drains, streams, and rivers. It has been found that globally, the most common pollutants in water are cigarettes, plastic bottles, food wrappers and containers, plastic bottle caps, plastic bags, cups, plates and cutlery, plastic straws and stirrers, glass bottles, beverage cans and paper bags.

Most, if not all, of these can be seen in our own swollen rivers—along with old mattresses, discarded appliances, and coconut shells.

Perhaps hope lies with the young. As school holidays begin, activities that centre around the environment can become the focus of holiday camps and classes. A well-conceived and wisely implemented national service-type plan could cultivate  awareness, care and responsibility in our children and young adults, helping them to become co-creators and co-guardians of our shared living space.