Congratulations to the Oblate parishes of Inchicore, Dublin, which have become the first Roman Catholic parishes to win an Eco-Congregation Ireland (ECI) award.
The Diocese of Kerry, where 20 parishes are eco-active, won the first ECI diocesan award in May this year, but the parishes of Inchicore are the first to win a parish award.
The Justice, Peace and Integrity of Creation (JPIC) group in Inchicore has been working hard on eco matters since 2008. The group consists of members of three Oblate parishes – Mary Immaculate, St Michael’s Parish and Our Lady of the Wayside, Bluebell.
The group has initiated many projects, including earth days, alternative shopping and Fairtrade events, knitting circles for Oxfam, nature walks and a gardening course to encourage people to grow their own vegetables. The latter proved a huge hit with non-churchgoers as well as parishioners. The children in the parish school also tend their own garden.
The group also runs regular workshops
for local community groups as well as other parishes throughout Ireland, and even in the UK, aimed at encouraging people to lead more eco-friendly lives.
During Tree Week this year the group launched a Tree Gift Card to support an ambitious reforestation project taking place on the Indonesian island of Nusa Kambangan. See http://oblatemissions.ie/jpic/gifttree.
As well as celebrating Creation Time (September 1 to October 4) each year with special liturgy and creation-related hymns, the group also celebrates the dawn chorus, the solstice, dawn on Easter morning and various Celtic feasts, including St Brigid.
The ECI award was presented during a special Creation-themed Mass in September. Gifts brought to the altar included reminders of the gifts of God’s creation. These included a beautiful arrangement of flowers grown in the community garden, a basket of home-grown vegetables and hand-made, fairly-traded wood products from Madagascar.
Catherine Brennan SSL, chairperson of ECI, presented the award and delivered the following homily:
“Everything in God’s creation matters to God and reveals something of God – from the tiniest insect to the largest mountain. God’s creation is at risk at the present time – it is sick and dying – in some parts it is dead. Furthermore, what we do to the earth – God’s Creation – we do to ourselves. We cannot be healthy on a sick planet. And it is the poor who suffer most. Whole islands are disappearing in some parts of the world from the effects of climate change. Crops are being destroyed, either because of no rain, or too much rain.
“Future generations everywhere will suffer. Our earth
is like the deaf and dumb man in today’s gospel – in need of care and healing. We, the people of the earth, are like him too – deaf to the cry of the earth and dumb when it comes to speaking about the destruction and lack of care.
“In today’s gospel Jesus heals the deaf and dumb man and, as followers of Jesus, we are called to be healers, to care for and heal God’s Creation. Indeed, the parishes here in Inchicore have been doing just that in the past couple of years and I’m here today on behalf of Eco-Congregation Ireland to congratulate you and present an award for the caring and healing work that has gone on and, hopefully, will continue.
“You are making history today as you are the first
Catholic parish in Ireland to receive such an award. Eco-Congregation is an inter-church group that was set up a few years ago to help Christian churches in Ireland celebrate the beauty of God’s Creation and care for and heal it in the way we live, work, shop, travel and pray.
“In Inchicore you have been involved in so many projects – in Fairtrade, organic gardening, ”Be the Change “ workshops , prayer services, special Creation Eucharists, the Christmas gift project for Madagascar … to name but a few. But I want to pick out one in particular – the tree gift cards. Through these cards you are helping to plant a tropical forest in an island in Indonesia. I can’t think of anything more important you could be doing at this time or the
healing of the earth and the poor people of that island at this time.
“Tropical rainforests are like the lungs of the earth and we all know how important lungs are for health and well-being. These forests help mitigate the effects of climate change. For just €5 you plant a tree. How beautiful! How healing! Co-creating with God and healing with Jesus.
“And do you know what? According to a recent EU-commissioned study, the global economy is losing more money from the disappearance of forests than from the current banking crisis. Incredible!
“Here in Inchicore you are fulfilling the hope of the prophet Isaiah in the first reading today because of your caring for Creation work. ‘Water gushes in the desert, streams in the wasteland, the scorched earth becomes a lake, the parched land springs of water.’
“An Irishman, Edmund Burke, who lived over 200 years ago, said, ‘Nobody made a great mistake than he/she who did nothing because he/she could only do a little.’
“May you go forward into the future as one sacred community with the whole of Creation and may you be abundantly blessed by God in your personal and family lives.”
To find out more re Inchicore’s initiatives, see https://www.ecocongregationireland.com/archives/3537