Clean Up Australia Day - March 6

The time to act, and to act together, is now! - Photo:canva.comThe time to act, and to act together, is now! - Photo:canva.com

Clean Up Australia Day is an annual event that was started by one person over thirty years ago, and is now the nation’s largest environmental community-based initiative. Many families, schools, businesses and organizations participate in activities on the day, to raise awareness and help care for the environment.  The focus of Clean Up Australia has grown over the years, to now inspire the community to live more sustainably each day of the year.  Clean Up Australia says, “there are so many ways to step up.  And remember, you don’t have to be perfect to be amazing!  Thousands of small steps, make a big difference – together we can all be part of the solution.”  

Columban missionaries are committed to adopting a simple lifestyle and making choices towards right relationships that bear witness to a love for the whole of Creation.  In the June 2020 edition of the Missionary Society of St Columban’s Fiji newsletter e-Kaulotu, Columban student Elia Poasa said: “as Fijians we are very much inter-connected to our environment and with creation.  We depend on creation for survival and also for a sense of identity. During my spiritual year I have come to an awareness that God is present in creation.  We should trust in God with the way we depend on God’s creation, for our identity and our survival.”  Elia and other members of the community participated in ecological workshops during their spiritual year.  He said: “We hope we will bring forward these theological and practical learnings in whatever places and gardens we will be assigned to in the future.” 

The rich heritage of faith is a resource to continue to draw upon.  Pope Francis, in his Encyclical letter Laudato Si’ explains that ecological conversion is about “acting in ways that nurture communion: healing and renewing our common home… the transformation of hearts and minds toward greater love of God, each other and creation (#217).” 

In July 2021, the Vatican Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development launched the Laudato Si’ Reader: An Alliance of Care for Our Common Home.  The publication contains reflections from groups around the world who are engaged in efforts to respond to urgent social and ecological problems. In his preface to the Laudato Si’ Reader, Pope Francis says, “This is a moment to dream big, to rethink our priorities – what we value, what we want, what we seek – and re-plan our future, committing to act in our daily life on what we have dreamed of. The time to act, and to act together, is now!” 

Sr Caroline Vaitkunas RSM, Peace, Ecology and Justice Team member, Columban Mission Centre, Essendon. 

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