Two parishes in the Diocese of Kerry initiated a Gathering for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation on 1 September to mark Creation 
Time. The following is a report of the event from Sylvia Thompson, a member of the Diocese of Kerry Justice Peace and Integrity of Creation Committee.
Gathering for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation in Tralee Town Park
This was our second year to gather but, noting the wind, we came together in the shelter offered in the Town Park’s Sensory Garden around the standing stone. This standing stone is in alignment with Queen Scotia’s Grave in the glen above Tralee.
It was a day of gentle mist but still people came , perhaps responding to the call of Pope Francis in Laudato Si “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” (LS#217).
With bulbs and seeds, apples, bowls of water and earth in front of the great stone we began by quietening down to beautiful flute music provided by James. Then we heard some excerpts from Laudato Si; reminding us that our common home is like both a sister and a mother who opens her arms to embrace us”, (LS#1) yet this sister “now cries out to us because of the harm “we have inflicted on her” (LS#2)and having named some signs of this we see around us and reflected on our call to change and act as we named all those working for the care of creation locally. We joined together in the Canticle of the Creatures, the great hymn of St Francis and the prayer for our earth from Laudato Si*
Then, before we went our different ways, we blessed our neighbours’ hands with water calling each of us to care for creation. And of course James continued to play at intervals and we all got to share the apples and seeds and bulbs at the end!
*All-powerful God, you are present in the whole universe and in the smallest of your creatures.
You embrace with your tenderness all that exists. Pour out upon us the power of your love, that we may protect life and beauty.
Fill us with peace that we may live as brothers and sisters, harming no one.
O God of the poor, help us to rescue the abandoned and forgotten of this earth, so precious in your eyes.
Bring healing to our lives, that we may protect the world and not prey on it, that we may sow beauty, not pollution and destruction. Laudato Si
Sylvia Thompson
6 September 2016
