The Ghana Catholic Bishops’ Conference (GCBC) has launched the Goal 6 of the Ecological Spirituality of Pope Francis’ Encyclical, ‘Laudato Si’ at the National Catholic Secretariat as part of the Conference’s ‘Laudato Si’ Action Programme.
Goal six of ‘Laudato Si’ which is about the pastoral journey towards achieving ecological spirituality was launched on March 16 by the GCBC to call for co-responsible stewardship of the earth and to change the heart and mindset of individuals towards the environment so as to care for God’s creation.
This Goal is aimed at training children, students, parishioners, priests and the lay faithful in morals and values through liturgical celebrations of Sacraments and catechesis in order to change the perceptions about the environment and also to influence people’s attitudes to the environment.
The Most Rev. Charles Gabriel Palmer-Buckle, Metropolitan Archbishop of Cape Coast and also the chairperson of the occasion, in his address, stated that the GCBC, following Pope Francis’ Encyclical on ‘Laudato Si’, has put in place the GCBC ‘Laudato Si’ Action Programme to address issues relating to the environment and also to create training programmes for the youth to equip themselves with skills to gain employment.
He said that the sixth goal of the five-year Action Programme page of Laudato Si reflects an ecological conversion.
With this in mind, the Archbishop said all duty-bearers and participants, are encouraged to make political and religious contributions to God’s gratuitous creation in order to promote dignified contact with the natural world.
All are invited to discuss and take action on how social vision can be reclaimed as responsible stewards, he added, saying, during this period of lent, individuals should not only “fast from food, but from the excessive exploitation and abuses of nature for our own good.”
The launch of the Goal six of Laudato Si which was sponsored by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops had representatives from the ministry of Land and Natural Resources, staff and members of the National Catholic Secretariat, the Christian Council of Ghana, the Ghana Pentecostal Council and the Catholic Women Association.
