Catholic Climate Covenant Request

We are living in uncertain and troubling times. President-elect Trump has stated his intent to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement, an agreement supported by Pope Francis and the result of over a decade of negotiations by global leaders.  He has also questioned the veracity of climate change and climate science. Last week, he nominated Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt who questions the climate science consensus and was among the first attorneys general to sue the EPA to stop the Clean Power Plan, a national carbon pollution standard supported by the U.S. bishops.

As Catholics, we recognize our responsibility to advocate on behalf of creation and the poor. Our advocacy is now more important than ever. Please join us in reaching our goal to deliver a petition signed by thousands of Catholics calling on President Trump to honor the Paris Agreement, the Green Climate Fund, and the Clean Power Plan!

We need you to add your voice and we need your help to reach others!                                          

The petition calls upon our next president to honor our international commitments and to act to solve the climate crisis. We plan to deliver the petition to the President shortly after the inauguration on January 20th. 

Please distribute the petition widely. Share the electronic link with friends and family, on social media, and in your parish bulletin. Use the paper version to collect signatures after Mass or during other church or school events. For more ideas about how to promote the petition download our toolkit.

Please sign and then distribute the petition widely!

We thank you for your support and solidarity. Together we will ensure that the Catholic voice is heard and that our common home and the poor are protected. Consider making a donation today to support this and all our climate advocacy efforts in 2017. Together we will make a difference!

Catholic Climate Covenant

Mark your calendar for 2017

November 2017 Chestnut Hill College will host its Fifth Annual Urban Sustainability Conference at the Sugar Loaf Campus. Watch for more details.

LCWR Commits to Gospel Values in the Post-Presidential Election Season

November 17, 2016

The presidency and staff of the Leadership Conference of Women Religious congratulate President-elect Donald J. Trump and promise to work with him to build a society worthy of our values where the dignity of each person is respected and all can flourish.

We thank Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton for her many years of service and sacrifice on behalf of our nation. We are especially grateful for her tireless commitment to promoting the wellbeing of women and girls everywhere.

After a difficult and contentious election characterized by partisan rancor and divisive rhetoric, it is time for all of us to ask forgiveness and be reconciled with one another. We are called to “. . . put on a heart of compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience. Bear with one another, and forgive whatever grievances you have against one another. Beyond all these things put on love which is the perfect bond of unity.” (Colossians 3:12-14)

Now is the time to heal the deep divisions laid bare by this bruising political campaign and to tear down the walls, real or imagined, which divide us by gender, race, class, geography, lifestyle, political party and belief. This moment, these times, require us to engage in deep contemplative prayer and to risk courageous action for the sake of all who call these United States their home.

Now is the time to make space in our hearts and our homes for the needs and concerns of all God’s people, the undocumented mother, the unemployed steel-worker father, and those children and elders consigned to live in poverty. It is long past time to make room in our politics for those who have been disaffected, disenfranchised, and discarded.

We recall the many times that Catholic sisters in the United States and around the world have been called upon to exercise courage in the face of fear and division. We promise once again to be the healing hands of God. We pledge to hold the needs and concerns of all in a contemplative space, in the heart of a loving and ever faithful God.

We recommit ourselves to the Gospel call to welcome the stranger, care for creation, establish economic justice, abolish every form of modern-day slavery, and promote nonviolence and just peace and we pledge to continue to work together with all people of good will to build God’s beloved community in this place we call home.

From Darkness to Light..

Winter Solstice Prayer

When:
Wednesday,
December 21, 2016
6:30 p.m.
Gather at
SSJ Earth Center
9701 Germantown Ave.
Chestnut Hill,
Philadelphia
Procession to
Labyrinth
Prayer in Mount
Saint Joseph Convent
Auditorium followed
by winter snacks
Please R.S.V.P.
215-248-7289 or
mclark@ssjphila.org
Directions:
Turn right into front gate off
Germantown Avenue •
Turn right at first driveway • Earth Center
is on your left • Park in lower lot.

Solstice is Wednesday December 21, 2016

Advent- Christmas 2016                                

Happy Advent to you! What a year of surprises! Just as Joseph had to move quickly to protect the holy family, we need to be alert to the needs of families having to leave lands of violence and oppression in our day. It never ends…the need for mercy and love! I am a fan of Pope Francis who issued a new set of Beatitudes. "Blessed are those who remain faithful while enduring evils inflicted on them by others and forgive them from their heart.

"Blessed are those who look into the eyes of the abandoned and marginalized and show them their closeness.

"Blessed are those who see God in every person and strive to make others also discover him.

"Blessed are those who protect and care for our common home.

"Blessed are those who renounce their own comfort in order to help others.

"Blessed are those who pray and work for full communion between Christians."

"All these are messengers of God's mercy and tenderness," Pope Francis said. "Surely they will receive from him their merited reward."

 I am  thankful for the blessings of good health and happiness in my life.

Have a blessed Christmas and happy new year!

Idea for Christmas Gift

"From My Heart to God's"

Mary Elizabeth Clark, SSJ

A book of poems and prayers with beautiful photos from nature to accompany each one!

Sale price $10.00 plus postage or pick up.

Order through

mclark@ssjphila.org

Book Sale

Now at reduced price of $10.00 plus postage if mailed or can be picked up.
Author: Sister Mary ELizabeth Clark, SSJ
Prayers and Poems
Photography by Sister Joellen Sbrissa, CSJ
Call 215-248-7289
mclark@ssjphila.org

Online course awakens beginners to unfolding universe story

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• In this image from the Hubble Space Telescope, a bluish nebula of glowing hydrogen expands out into the remains of a molecular cloud that collapsed to form massive stars. (CNS photo/NASA, ESA, and the Hubble Heritage Team)

A set of online courses set to debut this week will offer students an introductory dive into cosmological thought and the epic story of the unfolding of the universe and life itself.
“Journey of the Universe: A Story for Our Times” is a course series created by Mary Evelyn Tucker and John Grim, both research scholars in Yale University’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and co-founders of its Forum on Religion and Ecology.
The three-class program explores the universe’s formation through a multidisciplinary lens, along with the evolutionary implications for humans and their ecological future. It builds off the worldview of Passionist Fr. Thomas Berry, with one of the classes dedicated to his life and insights.
Tucker and Grim, who will teach the courses, are both students of Berry. In Tucker's words, she and Grim, her husband, have “lived and breathed” elements of the “Journey” work for more than 30 years since they studied with Berry in graduate school.

Pope Francis adds New Work of Mercy to Original Corporal and Spiritual Works of Mercy

As Pope Francis adds Care for Creation as a Corporal and Spiritual Work of Mercy,

this explanation was published in the Catholic New York newspaper.

“ As a spiritual work of mercy, the pope said, care for

Creation requires “a grateful contemplation of God’s world.”

While as a corporal work, it calls for “simple daily gestures

which break with the logic of violence, exploitation and

selfishness.” The Year of Mercy, he added, offers Christians an opportunity to

experience not only an interior conversion but also an “ecological conversion,”

one that recognizes “our responsibility to ourselves, our neighbors, creation and the Creator.”

Here are the Corporal Works of Mercy

1.       Feed the hungry

2.       Shelter the homeless

3.       Clothe the naked

4.       Visit the sick and imprisoned

5.       Bury the dead

6.       Give alms to those who are poor

7.       Care for our common home

Here are the Spiritual Works of Mercy

1.       Instruct

2.       Advise

3.       Console

4.       Comfort

5.       Forgive

6.       Bear wrongs patiently

7.       Care for our common home

( translation from Loyola Press)