Sisters Celebrate Earth Day 2015

 

While the Dominican Sisters of Hope united to approve a corporate stance on climate change (and committed to working on climate change impacts), they celebrated Earth Day 2015 across the country.

Above, Dominican Sister of Hope Rosemarie Wdzieczkowski, OP, and the children and staff at Our Lady of Good Counsel Early Childhood Center, Moorestown, NJ, celebrate Earth Day 2015 with an Earth Day Prayer Service. Sister Rosemarie has been a kindergarten teacher at the school since 1997, and she participated in an Early Childhood Prayer Service for the youngsters yesterday. The children thanked God for our world and sang songs of thanks and praise to God. The children are pictured above praying in the parish Peace Prayer Garden.

Below, the sisters and staff at Mariandale Retreat and Conference Center (a sponsored ministry of the Dominican Sisters of Hope) held an Earth Day 2015 prayer service celebration on the Mariandale grounds. The service included a litany of thanking the Source of Life for the gift of Earth, quiet reflection, a group sharing of ways to enhance Earth’s future, planting of seeds, and a song.

Standing between Mariandale’s peace pole and a statue of the Blessed Mother, Dominican Sister of Hope Donna Brunell read aloud the sisters’ newly approved corporate stance on climate change.

The following prayer was spoken by the group:

Loving Source of Life, we, being of Earth and blessed with the Spirit living and acting within us, join together this Earth Day to renew our awe and appreciation of our precious planet. May our awe and appreciation result in actions that witness to our concerns for Earth. We ask that your presence within us will empower us to co-create a thriving planet now and into the future. Amen.

The sisters’ celebration of Earth Day 2015 comes as Pope Francis himself prepares an encyclical due this July on climate change and our responsibility in both sharing the cause of it and being part of the solution.