ROME (AP) — Pope Leo XIV celebrated what has been dubbed as the first “green” papal Mass, using a new set of prayers imploring care for God’s creation in a sign he intends to emphasize environmental stewardship and climate justice for the world’s mos
ROME (AP) — Pope Leo XIV celebrated what has been dubbed as the first “green” papal Mass, using a new set of prayers imploring care for God’s creation in a sign he intends to emphasize environmental stewardship and climate justice for the world’s most vulnerable people.
The Mass, in the gardens of the Vatican’s new ecological educational center at the papal summer estate in Castel Gandolfo, indicated a strong line of ecological continuity withPope Francis, who made environmental protection a hallmark of his pontificate.
The private Mass on Wednesday was celebrated for the Laudato Si center, named forFrancis’ 2015 environmental encyclicalin which the first pope from the Global South blasted the way wealthy countries and multinational corporations had exploited the Earth and its most vulnerable people for profit.
Leo approved the new Mass formula “for the care of creation,” directing it to be added into the list of 49 Masses that have been developed over centuries for a specific need or occasion. Officials said it was crafted in response to requests stemming from Francis’ encyclical, which hasinspired a whole church movementand foundation to educate, advocate and sensitize the world to the biblically mandated call to care for nature.
Leo, history’s first American pope, has indicated he intends to furtherFrancis’ ecological legacy.
A longtime missionary in Peru, Leo experienced firsthand the effects of climate change on vulnerable communities and has already spoken out about the need for climate justice for Indigenous peoples, in particular. In a message for the church’s annual day of prayer for creation, Leo blasted the “injustice, violations of international law and the rights of peoples, grave inequalities and the greed that fuels them are spawning deforestation, pollution and the loss of biodiversity.”
He made no equivocations about what or who was to blame, identifying “climate changes provoked by human activity.”
“As yet, we seem incapable of recognizing that the destruction of nature does not affect everyone in the same way. When justice and peace are trampled underfoot, those who are most hurt are the poor, the marginalized and the excluded,” he wrote in the message, released last week.
Leo celebrated the Mass during the first days of his vacation at Castel Gandolfo, a hilltop town overlooking Lake Alban in the cool hills south of Rome. Leo arrived on Sunday and will spend an initial two weeks there before returning to the Vatican and then heading back in August.
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Nicole Winfield, The Associated Press