Dear Sisters and Family of the Incarnation:
The encyclical Laudato Si’ was published in May 2015, and the Laudato Si’ Movement organizes Laudato Si’Week every year to commemorate it. Thus, from May 17 to 24, all Christians are called to unite with the global commitment of the whole Church.
We have a valuable source to refer to when taking care of creation. Several chapters of the Book of Life echo this, for example:
LV II No. 38: “The land is given to us as a good to share, so we avoid misuse, waste of natural resources and promote harmony and balance of life on earth.”
Our faith pushes us to move from awareness to action. Caring for creation is an act of love, an act of justice, and an act of faith.
As a commission, we thank all the communities who sent us their contributions for the LS 2026 Plan. And we think it's very important to give thanks and acknowledge everything we're already doing.
Therefore, to participate in Laudato Si’Week, we propose that all communities in the congregation pray for the most vulnerable and for Mother Earth on Friday, May 22. Each community can choose its own approach; some might even pray outdoors.
What we invite you to do is to name and thank for the ecological gestures or habits we already have; it can be useful to use flowers or stones as a symbol, so that whenever we name an action, we place the symbol next to the lit candle that represents the resurrected Christ, and that will testify to our committed life.
Thousands of Christians are committed to the planet that week. We dare to suggest that we could join, if possible, the “Meatless Fridays in the Menu”, as a sign of solidarity with the poorest and the planet. Our food choices have an impact on both individuals and the environment.
Through our prayers and our common actions carried out on different continents, our communities become important testimonies of hope.
As a commission, we would be very happy if, at the end of the month, you could send us an eco of your experience and list us actions you mentioned in your prayer.
We conclude by sharing with you this prayer created by Thérèse Signone for our last Zoom meeting last Saturday.
Prayer for our common home
Creator God and father of tenderness, you who called us to follow Jesus incarnate verb, you also entrust this earth to us as a garden to guard. We, your servants from several countries, place this time of sharing before you.
Teach us to contemplate your creation like Francis of Assisi, to recognize in every creature the reflection of your goodness. Allow us to look at the earth with your eyes, love it with your heart and serve it with our hands. May our consecrated life become a seed of ecological hope.
Forgive our slowness and complicity with a world that hurts the poor and nature. Convert our hearts to ‘joyful sobriety’, our communities to integral ecology, our missions in defense of the most fragile as well as that of the land that cries out.
Give us the clarity of your mind, so that we can discern together concrete paths: in our lifestyles, our commissaries, our apostolates, our formations.
May our vow of poverty set us free to choose the least and the best, may our vow of obedience open us to listening to the cry of the earth, and may our vow of chastity expand our love to all creation.
Saint Mary, a woman attentive to Cana and at the foot of the Cross, accompany us so that, like you, we may say "Do whatever he tells you" in the service of life, justice and peace. AMEN
United in prayer and commitment.
International Commission on Integral Ecology
1 May 2026