Pope Benedict says to react urgently to create a strong bond between man and the land
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http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=10281
Monks take part in a meeting between Pope Benedict XVI and youths in Loreto, central Italy
Two nuns eat ice cream on a field where Pope Benedict XVI is expected to meet youth during his pilgrimage to Loreto, central Italy, Saturday, Sept. 1, 2007. The pontiff is taking a new step in the Vatican's environmental campaign, leading a Catholic youth festival this weekend where participants will use recycled prayer books, biodegradable plates and recycling bags for their trash.
http://sognodargento.blogspot.com/2007/09/pope-benedict-visits-loreto.html
On Saturday, the Italian Church sponsored its annual “Saving Creation Day” in Loreto, Italy. Pope Benedict helped mark the day by telling the 300,000 young people gathered at the popular Marian shrine, that they must be responsible with the gift of God’s creation.
Marking “Save Creation Day”, an initiative of the Italian bishops, the Pope also called on the young people present to protect the environment, asking them to “react urgently .... to recreate a strong bond between Man and Earth and to reverse trends which risk causing irreparable damage."
Before it is too late, the Pope said, “it is necessary to have the courage to choose, to recreate a strong alliance between man and the land. A decisive ‘yes’ is needed to protect creation and to provide a strong commitment to reverse those tendencies that risk making certain situations irreversible.”
Benedict XVI also made a particular appeal to safeguard the precious resource of water, and warned that “if it is not shared in a fair and peaceful manner, severe tensions will unfortunately turn into harsh conflicts”.===
Pope attends environmentally friendly youth festival in run-up to Sydney World Youth Day
AP
2007-08-31 19:12:57
http://angelqueen.org/forum/viewtopic.php?p=209776
Link to original
VATICAN CITY (AP) - Pope Benedict XVI is taking a new step in the Vatican's environmental campaign, leading a Catholic youth festival this weekend where participants will use recycled prayer books, biodegradable plates and recycling bags for their trash.
About 300,000 young Catholics are expected to attend the festival in Loreto, home of Italy's most famous Marian shrine, in a run-up to next year's World Youth Day in Sydney, Australia.
The festival coincides with the Catholic Church's «Save Creation Day,» and has a decidedly eco-friendly theme. Each participant will be given a knapsack _ made of recycled nylon _ containing a hand-cranked battery recharger, three sets of biodegradable plates and three bags for recycling trash.
The prayer books for Benedict's Sunday Mass will be made out of recycled paper, hydrogen cars will be on display and trees will be planted in areas of southern Italy recently devastated by forest fires to make up for the CO2 emissions the festival generates, organizers said.
The message about caring for the environment will be entrusted not just with words, but with the young people's gestures and the things they use,» said one of the event's organizers, the Rev. Paolo Giulietti.
The Italian company Novamont said the use of 400,000 of its biodegradable plates would amount to a reduction of C02 emissions of 8 tons. As a result, it said, Loreto will be an «environmentally low-impact» event.
The Vatican has been going greener under Benedict, installing photovoltaic cells on the roof of its main auditorium to convert sunlight into electricity and joining a reforestation project aimed at offsetting its CO2 emissions.
Just this week, the pope bemoaned the destruction wrought by the recent forest fires in Greece and Italy, saying the blazes destroyed «humanity's precious environmental patrimony.
Benedict's predecessor, Pope John Paul II, frequently spoke out about the need to care for God's creation. And the spiritual leader of the world's Orthodox Christians, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, is known as the «green patriarch» for his environmental initiatives.
The head of the Italian bishops' conference, Monsignor Angelo Bagnasco, told Vatican Radio it was the responsibility of the Church to teach its young about caring for the planet.
The youth rally has a poignant aspect: Loreto was dear to John Paul, and was the site of his final pilgrimage, in September 2004.
The city is famous for the Holy House, a simple stone cottage that the faithful believe was the house in Nazareth where the Virgin Mary was raised and received the annunciation. Legend has it that angels transported it from the Holy Land to the Loreto area, in central Italy near the Adriatic coast, in 1294.
Benedict is due to visit the cottage for a moment of prayer Saturday night after taking questions from the youths. On Sunday, he will celebrate a morning Mass and return to the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo south of Rome for the rest of his summer holiday.
The Loreto meeting, organized by the Italian bishops' conference, is in many ways an Italian warm-up for World Youth Day, to be held in Sydney July 15-20. The 80-year-old Benedict is expected to journey to Australia for that event.
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Save The Planet Before It's Too Late, Pope Urges
ITALY: September 3, 2007
http://www.planetark.com/dailynewsstory.cfm/newsid/44080/story.htm
LORETO, Italy - Pope Benedict, leading the Catholic Church's first 'eco-friendly' youth rally, on Sunday told up to half a million people that world leaders must make courageous decisions to save the planet "before it is too late".
"A decisive 'yes' is needed in decisions to safeguard creation as well as a strong commitment to reverse tendencies that risk leading to irreversible situations of degradation," the 80-year-old Pope said.
Wearing green vestments, he spoke to a crowd of mostly young people sprawled over a hillside near the Adriatic city of Loreto on the day Italy's Catholic Church marks it annual Save Creation Day.
More than 300,000 people had slept on blankets and in tents or prayed during the night. Organisers said they were joined by some 200,000 more who arrived from throughout Italy on Sunday.
"New generations will be entrusted with the future of the planet, which bears clear signs of a type of development that has not always protected nature's delicate equilibriums," the Pope said, speaking from a white stage.
In one of his strongest environmental appeals, Benedict said: "Courageous choices that can re-create a strong alliance between man and earth must be made before it is too late."
The Pope closed the rally with a Sunday morning mass.
It was the first environmentally friendly youth rally, a break from gatherings that have left tonnes of garbage.
Participants had backpacks made of recyclable material, flashlights operated by a crank instead of batteries, and colour-coded trash bags so personal garbage could be easily recycled. Meals were served on biodegradable plates.
Tens of thousands of prayer books for Sunday's mass were printed on recycled paper and an adequate number of trees will be planted to compensate for the carbon produced at the event, many in areas of southern Italy devastated by recent brushfires.
Under Benedict and his predecessor John Paul, the Vatican has become progressively "green", installing photovoltaic cells on buildings to produce electricity and hosting a scientific conference to discuss global warming and climate change.
Benedict voiced concern about a breakdown of the traditional family and in his Sunday homily told young people to "go against the current" and challenge "seductive" media messages promoting materialism, consumerism and fleeting pleasures.
Loreto is famous in the Catholic world for the "holy house of the Madonna", a small stone structure purported to be where Mary grew up in the Holy Land and where she was told by an angel she would give birth to Jesus although a virgin.
Story by Philip Pullella
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