Creation Care Ministry marks 10 years of helping archdiocese ‘live out Laudato Si’
In this photo from June 12, a bee flies in search of nectar in a wildflower meadow on the campus of St. Thomas the Apostle Parish in Fortville. The meadow was a project of the parish’s Creation Care ministry as an effort to increase local biodiversity and attract pollinators like bees, birds and other insects. (Photo by Natalie Hoefer)
By Natalie Hoefer
Ten years ago, in June 2015, Pope Francis issued his landmark encyclical, “Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home.”
In it, the pope made this stark proclamation:
“The pace of consumption, waste and environmental change has so stretched the planet’s capacity that our contemporary lifestyle, unsustainable as it is, can only precipitate catastrophes, such as those which even now periodically occur in different areas of the world. The effects of the present imbalance can only be reduced by our decisive action, here and now” (#161).
Those are not passive words.
Retired Louisville, Ky., Archbishop Joseph E. Kurtz, then-president of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, called the encyclical “our marching orders for advocacy” of care for creation and those negatively impacted—predominantly the poor—by a lack of doing so.
From those “marching orders” arose the archdiocesan Creation Care Ministry.
In the 10 years since its fledgling start, the team has worked hard to educate Catholics in central and southern Indiana about the encyclical’s message and to promote actions toward care for the environment by individuals and parishes. (Related story: Parishes in central and southern Indiana share sustainability success stories)
As co-founding member Sharon Horvath says, “Our hope is for people to see [care for creation] not as a side issue of the faith but as integral to who we are as Catholics.”
Ten years ago, the small group of founders had no idea the impact they would have locally, nationally and globally.
‘You’re officially a commission!’
St. Thomas Aquinas Parish in Indianapolis was ahead of its time in emphasizing the importance of care for the environment as an issue of faith, starting a ministry in 2007.
The parish team heard that an encyclical on the topic was coming out in 2015. In anticipation of the document, they hosted a large “eco-prayer” breakfast that March at Marian University in Indianapolis and invited
then-Archbishop Joseph W. Tobin.
“A group of about six or eight of us spoke with Archbishop Tobin after the breakfast about what we could do to raise awareness about the encyclical in the archdiocese,” says ministry co-founder John Mundell, president and senior environmental consultant for Mundell and Associates. He and his wife Julie, who also helped start the ministry, are members of Our Lady of Lourdes Parish in Indianapolis. “Archbishop Tobin kind of gave us a push, or at least support, to begin.”
The founding members hailed from several parishes in the Indianapolis area. Like Mundell, each had environmental expertise—two in education, one in a role with her religious order, another as a lawyer, and more.
“We realized we had this full array of expertise,” says Mundell. “We thought about what we could do to help the archdiocese respond to the encyclical, to make the Church more sustainable.
“We didn’t know where we were going. We just knew we were all in it together.”
Archbishop Tobin continued to encourage the group.
“Then he was made a cardinal and swept away from the archdiocese” in 2016, Mundell notes.
Support for the team continued in 2017 with newly installed Archbishop Charles C. Thompson. In fact, he wanted to make the group “more formal” and tasked the team to develop a mission statement, says Mundell.
And so they did: “To encourage and foster the care for God’s creation as a way of life and a core principle of our Catholic faith, and to minimize the archdiocese’s impact on the environment.”
The mission was supported by a vision statement and guiding principles.
In 2018, the archbishop approved the statement. Mundell recalls Archbishop Thompson’s enthusiastic response: “I like this. This is great. Yes, go ahead—you’re officially a commission!”
‘We had just ramped up, then … ’
The Creation Care Ministry team started simply—developing a social media presence, speaking at parishes and schools, even hosting a booth at the 2017 National Catholic Youth Conference in Indianapolis to “engage with youths on how to live out ‘Laudato Si’, ” says Mundell.
The group took on its first major project in 2019—a sustainability pilot group of four parishes and
Father Thomas Scecina Memorial High School, all on the east side of Indianapolis.
The project included educational workshops and “an audit of their energy, waste, water and land use,” says Mundell. “And we helped them put together a 12-month program to carry out after the audit. … It was very successful.”
That same year, the Creation Care Ministry led the archdiocese in celebrating for the first time the
long-established annual global Season of Creation from Sept. 1 to Oct. 4, sending parishes weekly action guides and reflections to share and organizing the archdiocese’s first Mass for the Season of Creation.
(Related: Top five eco-friendly things even you can do!)
“We still do that every year, rotating it to different parishes around the archdiocese,” says ministry member Benedictine Sister Sheila Marie Fitzpatrick.
Then came 2020.
“It was so disappointing,” says Mundell. “We had just ramped up, then boom, COVID hit.”
But on the other side of the globe, the Vatican was developing an initiative that would share the archdiocesan Creation Care Ministry’s work—and one member—with the rest of the world.
An impact locally, nationally and globally
The Vatican’s Laudato Si’ Action Platform (LSAP) was created to help individuals and organizations around the world set goals to take concrete action in caring for creation. It launched in 2021.
“We were one of only 10 dioceses in the world to sign up because we were already working on an archdiocesan plan,” says Mundell.
The plan—with seven goals and steps to accomplish them—was submitted in May of 2023.
The year before the plan was submitted, Mundell was named LSAP’s global director, a position he held through spring of this year.
Encouraging parishes in central and southern Indiana to participate in the LSAP is one of the goals of the archdiocesan Creation Care Ministry, says Horvath.
“It’s a way for them to come up with concrete plans, a roadmap for the parish of things they can do to become more sustainable,” she says.
Developing and submitting the archdiocese’s LSAP plan are two of the fruits of the ministry’s labor during the last decade.
“In the last few years, we helped 10 parishes assess steps to take to increase energy efficiency and save money,” says Sister Sheila Marie.
“We’ve helped parishes start a Creation Care ministry. We’ve created ideas and toolkits, something concrete to help care for creation, whether at the parish level or home.
“We’ve worked with teachers, trying to create things they can use in the classroom, and with parishes, like how to help them with recycling in their cafeteria or parish festival.”
Sister Sheila Marie also notes the extensive resources available on the Creation Care Ministry’s website. Each of its four sections—Catholic social teaching, prayers/songs/liturgies, environmental justice and sustainable practices—has from four to nine pages of links to articles, documents, guides, handouts, webinars, other websites and more, as well as a link to the LSAP.
Mundell notes the team’s impact locally, nationally and globally. “We’ve had members be part of a national diocesan creation care group and given input on Catholic education programs around the world,” he says.
‘Everybody needs to be the doers’
Honestly speaking, though, Mundell says the team’s current members—all volunteer—“would say we’re never satisfied with what we’re doing. That’s who we are—we want to do more.”
Horvath says the ministry’s members recently identified “working on the energy piece” as a priority.
“We really want to encourage people to take a look at the energy they use in their lifestyle, how energy is used in businesses, homes and school,” she says.
“We really want to focus on going to net zero energy use. The archdiocese is working on that for the [Archbishop Edward T. O’Meara] Catholic Center and Xavier Building in Indianapolis. We want to try to get parishes to commit to that too.”
On a broader scale, Mundell would like people and parishes to “see creation care as a real ministry, as part of who we are as Catholics, part of our faith and practices, part of our stewardship.”
As Sister Sheila Marie notes, “We can educate and promote care for creation. But everybody needs to be the doers.”
(Learn more about the archdiocesan Creation Care Ministry and the ways it offers Catholics and parishes across central and southern Indiana to integrate care for the environment into their life of faith at ourcommonhome.org. To contact the team or for information on volunteering, send an e-mail to mail@ourcommonhome.org.) †
Related: Contribute to endowment fund to support sustainability projects in throughout the archdiocese
