Our commitment to Laudato Si’ Action Platform

Editor’s Note: Laudato Si’ Week is May 22-29 this year. In this blog, our Climate Change Task Force explains our commitment to the plan for the next seven years.

In the Winter 2022 edition of HOPE Magazine, Sister Cathy Campbell, SP, wrote an article introducing the Sisters of Providence Climate Change Task Force and its commitment to the Laudato Si’ Action Platform for the next seven years. We made the commitment on behalf of the Providence Community – the Sisters of Providence and the Providence Associates. The Laudato Si’ Action Platform names seven goals to frame our work, including:

• Response to the cry of the Earth,
• Response to the cry of the Poor,
• Ecological Economics,
• Adoption of Sustainable Lifestyles,
• Ecological Education,
• Ecological Spirituality and
• Community Resilience and Empowerment.

There are three documents necessary to formalize our enrollment on the Laudato Si’ Action Platform website. A Self-Assessment, a Reflection and a Plan. We are working on all three. Sister Barbara Battista, SP, and Providence Associate Jeannie Smith developed a survey. The entire Providence Community received the surveys and had opportunity to identify each person’s use of natural resources. We have received relevant data from Motherhouse Operations as well as surveys from individual members of the Providence Community. The collated data will be entered into the self-assessment on the Laudato Si’ Action Platform website.

Planning

Prior to 2017 when the Climate Change Task Force was formed, the Sisters of Providence had initiated many projects. Our reflection contains the entire slate of work done since 2011, including those projects sponsored by the Climate Change Task Force.

We intend for our formal plan to be available in 2023. This first year of the Laudato Si’ Action Platform is one of preparation and establishing ourselves on the Laudato Si’ Action Platform website. Each year, we will repeat the process, with the goal of reducing our carbon footprint, updating our reflection and providing status on projects we name in our plan.

For now, our plan can address all seven of these goals, or just a few. The idea is that over time, we will have developed projects that achieve each of the goals.

The Climate Change Task Force is excited to represent the Providence Community in its efforts to be a part of Pope Francis’ call to address the most urgent needs plaguing Earth and the poor and to take this focus into our daily lives.

Note: Members of the Climate Change Task Force include Sisters Barbara Battista, Cathy Campbell, Jeanne Hagelskamp, Marilyn Kofler, Barbara Sheehan and Mary Tomlinson in addition to Providence Associates Marilyn Antonik, Jessi Blessinger, Gene Majewski, Lynda Parker, Jan Showalter and Jeannie Smith.