We wish to encourage all our Catholic family - parishes, schools, communities and individuals to join in prayer to mark the Season of Creation from 1 September to 4 October - the feast of Saint Francis of Assisi.
The Season of Creation is the annual Christian celebration to pray and respond together to the cry of Creation: the ecumenical family around the world unites to listen and care for our common home. The “Celebration” begins 1 September, the Feast of Creation, and ends 4 October, the Feast of Saint Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of ecology beloved by many Christian denominations.
Our Biblical text for this year is Isaiah 32:14-18. The prophet Isaiah pictured the desolated Creation without peace because of the lack of justice and the broken relationship between God and humankind. This description of devastated cities and wastelands eloquently stresses the fact that human destructive behaviours have a negative impact on the Earth.
Our hope: Creation will find peace when justice is restored.
There is still hope and the expectation for a peaceful Earth.
To hope in a biblical context does not mean to stand still and quiet, but to act, pray, change, and reconcile with Creation and the Creator in unity, metanoia (repentance), and solidarity.
"Now is the time to follow words with deeds. “Living our vocation to be protectors of God’s handiwork is essential to a life of virtue; it is not an optional or a secondary aspect of our Christian experience” (Laudato Si’, 217).
"By working with love and perseverance, we can sow many seeds of justice and thus contribute to the growth of peace and the renewal of hope. It may well take years for this plant to bear its first fruits, years that, for their part, involve an entire ecosystem made up of continuity, fidelity, cooperation and love, especially if that love mirrors the Lord’s own self-sacrificing Love."
Pope Leo XIV made this appeal in his Message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, to be held on September 1, 2024, which was published Monday 30 June.
Full Message for World Day of Creation
This guide will help you learn about and plan for this season. It includes ideas for prayer, including an ecumenical prayer service and ways to incorporate and reflect on this year’s theme.
Season of Creation Celebration Guide
PEACE WITH CREATION Creator of all, we praise you for the gift of life and for the faith that unites us in care for our common home.
We confess how estranged we have become— from one another, from your Creation, and from our truest selves.
We acknowledge that our greed and destructive impulses have fractured our relationships with you, with others, and with the Earth. Fertile fields have become barren, forests lie desolate, oceans and rivers are polluted. Thriving communities have become places of suffering, and the earth cries out.
Season of Creation.org
It is 10 years since Pope Francis published the Encyclical Laudato Si', On Care for our Common Home. This document had an immediate effect and helped in achieving a consensus at the COP talks in Paris, 2015, the first such agreement made to combat man-made global warming. This year, COP30 will be in Belem, Brazil. Important planning meetings are taking place in the lead up to the COP. Please pray for the success of this COP.
Plan to become a Live Simply ParishArchbishop Bernard, and the Diocesan Care for Creation Committee, have called for parishes and schools to take on this Award. Our schools have responded, but not many parishes have registered.
To achieve this award, administered by CAFOD, you will need a small planning group. You choose your own targets, three each under the headings of Living Simply, Living Sustainably and Living in Solidarity, one of which should be a ‘major’ target, involving the whole parish or involving the outside community.
Register with CAFOD, who are very helpful with advice; keep records, and when you have completed your chosen actions CAFOD will check. Then celebrate the Award!
LiveSimply Award
Celebrate with your Schools
Last year, the parish priest at Holy Trinity in Newcastle under Lyme suggested inviting all the schools in their MAC to a Service of Thanksgiving. Their secondary school and feeder primaries were invited to a service. Each school prepared a poster showing some of their work on Caring for Creation, and representatives each gave a short talk, informing the parish of their achievements. This was a wonderful event.
Re-read and study Laudato Si'
Visit the Laudato Si' Movement website; become a Laudato Si' Animator, (take the next online course).
Laudato Si' Movement
Arrange for a Season of Creation Liturgy in your parish
A Catholic Liturgical Guide is available on the Season of Creation website, under resources.
Season of Creation Resources
Show the film ‘The Letter’
A powerful film by The Laudato Si' Movement. The film, and accompanying resources for a screening can be found here.
The Letter
Check the Laudato Si' Action Platform websiteThe Laudato Si' Action Platform equips Catholic institutions and individuals to journey towards total sustainability in the spirit of Laudato Si'.Sponsored by the Vatican’s Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, the Laudato Si’ Action Platform provides concrete resources to protect our common home.
Laudato Si' Action Platform
Check out the NEW Resource Sorter: Journey to 2030Need resources, ideas and inspiration to support you during the Season of Creation and beyond? Developed as part of the “Journey to 2030” project, the Resource Sorter is a searchable, filterable repository of key resources for parishes, schools, and individuals seeking to engage with the themes of care of creation and Catholic social teaching. The tool collates over 70 carefully-selected resources, including publications, partner materials, videos, books, and websites.
Journey to 2030 Resources
The Ecological Conversion Group
A small charity which is dedicated to inspiring action on the Care of Creation through responding to Pope Francis’ Encyclical Letter; Laudato Si’ On Care of Our Common Home.
One of our main projects “Journey to 2030” supports the Church and its wider community to respond to the cry of the earth and the poor.
Our mission is: “To help our Church Communities to dream of, and build a better future, for all.”
Laudato Si' 10th anniversary poster
Resources for parishes
The Journey to 2030
Prayer and Lifestyle Resources for the Season of CreationA list of prayer and lifestyle resources has been prepared by Caritas Diocese of Brentwood that can be flexibly used in your parish, school, or organisation:
CAFOD: Jubilee Spiritual Practices - RESTCAFOD in collaboration with Sr Margaret Sr Margaret Atkins, a Canoness of St Augustine has written a thoughtful article on one of the reasons for Jubilee – REST.
She speaks how the Sabbath, and by extension the Jubilee year, is about communal rest – rest for the earth and rest for people.
REST
OneLife Music
OPEN. for Creation 2025
Schools are invited to join with Dan and Emily each weekday of Creation, for these short times of prayer and song to celebrate the Season.
Latest news and information on the environment in the Archdiocese:
Environment in the Archdiocese
Parishioners celebrated Creation Sunday with a special liturgy and a display of Fr Graham Venn’s wildlife photos, created with help from teenage parishioners. Read more
Sacred Heart Church in Tamworth has turned surplus apples into a symbol of solidarity and sustainability with pies, crumbles and juice. Read more
St Michael’s Catholic Primary & Nursery Academy in Wolverhampton is delighted to have received the CAFOD LiveSimply Award, recognising the school community’s commitment to living simply, sustainably, and in solidarity with those in poverty. Read more
The Season of Creation Mass, held on the lawn outside the church, was a truly beautiful and uplifting celebration of God's creation. Read more
A personal reflection by parishioner and Justice and Peace Commission Member Phil Mayland Read more
In a statement to mark this year’s Season of Creation, the Lead Bishop for the Environment has called for Catholics in England and Wales to take action to address the environmental crises of our times Read more
2025 Year of Jubilee marks the 10th Anniversary of Laudato Si’, The 1700th Anniversary of the first Nicaean Council and the 800th Anniversary of St Francis’ Canticle of the Creatures Read more
The Decree for a Votive Mass for the Care of Creation was promulgated in a Press Conference in Rome on 3 July 2025. Read more
Brian Austin, from the Laudato Si UK Animators’ Writing Group, reflects on Carbon Offsetting. What is it? How we we use it responsibly? Read more
As the Invocation at Adoremus youth event took place during the Season of Creation, Salford Seminarian Paul Chisnall and Columban Justice, Peace and Ecology Coordinator James Trewby braved the rain to offer workshops exploring the call to 'Care for Our Common Home'. Read more
Parishioners at Our Lady of the Wayside, Shirley, presented with the CAFOD LiveSimply award Read more
By the Laudato Si' Institute at Oxford University. Read more