Readings: Wis. 13:1-9; Ps. 18; Col.1:15-20; Matt. 6:24-34.
Rev. Fr. Emmanuel Emenike Onyia.
UNDERSTANDING THE FUNCTION OF HUMANITY IN GOD’S CREATION
One of the greatest privileges given to humanity in the world is to manage God’s creation. This is not only a privilege but also a great responsibility and function of the human person: to ensure that what God has entrusted to our care is well cared for.
But a deep reflection on the history of how humanity has carried out this great responsibility shows that we have often neglected our duties towards God’s creation. Though we can not neglect the fact that we have, in little measure, enhanced the work of creation while creating more harm to created things.
Little wonder, this season the Holy Mother Church, through our Holy Father, the Pope, calls our attention to the need for us to pay serious attention to the care of Creation, and our liturgical celebration today focuses on this very important theme.
So today we are meant to understand that the care of creation means respecting and protecting our natural ecosystem and environment as a gift from God. A gift that reminds us of our duties and functions as stewards of God’s Creation. Therefore, we should develop a relationship with the rest of the created order in such a way that we live truly fulfilled and dignified lives in accordance with the mind of God the Creator, who said that all he created was very good.
Hence, the Holy Mother Church has been writing about the care of creation in her documents, and Pope Francis brought these documents together in Laudato si, where he talked about the human ecosystem, saying that we can better understand the importance and meaning of each creature if we contemplate it within the entirety of God’s plan.
With this notion, we can fundamentally understand why the call to care for creation becomes very important. Because, we are part of an order willed by God. And, being at the top of that order, we have a duty to care for the gift of the environment entrusted to us.
Hence, our readings today call our attention to this very fact. In the first reading, we are told that from the greatness and beauty of created things comes a corresponding perception of their Creator. For if we have the power to know so much that we could investigate the world, how did we fail to find sooner the Lord of these things?
And St. Paul in our second reading made us know that Jesus is the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation; for in him all things were created, in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or dominions or principalities or authorities all things were created through him and for him.
While in the Gospel we are meant to consider the lilies of the field, how they grow; they neither toil nor spin; yet, even Solomon in all his glory was not arrayed like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which today is alive and tomorrow is thrown into the oven, will he not much more clothe us?
Therefore do not be anxious, saying, ‘What shall we eat?’ or ‘What shall we drink?’ or ‘What shall we wear?’ For the Gentiles seek all these things; and our heavenly Father knows that we need them all. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things shall be ours as well.
Dear friends, we are God’s special vessels entrusted with his special gift of creation. We must understand our functions towards his creation. We are stewards, we act as caretakers of the earth rather than absolute masters. We must have an Interconnection with what has been entrusted to us. This means protecting the environment, caring for human life, and vulnerable communities.
We have the moral responsibility of governing the ecosystems. Our disregard for the natural inhabitants of creation damages the relationship between humanity and the Creator. Therefore, we must be careful how we use created things with regard to the problem of consumerism. For we often desire to have and to enjoy created things rather than to nurture and grow them. We consume the resources of the earth in an excessive and disordered way. We think that we can make use of the created things without respecting the principles that guide them.
Hence, we are called to conserve resources and reduce wastage of resources, especially food and mineral resources. We are to eat locally grown food, avoid excessive packaging, and compost organic material, respect natural inheritance and grow more mature in management. Pope Francis, in Laudato Si ', says that “The human person grows more, matures more and is sanctified more to the extent that he or she enters into relationships, going out from themselves to live in communion with God, with others and with all creatures. This is the essence of today’s celebration.
LET US PRAY:
Heavenly Father, we thank you for the gift of creation, forgive us for those moments we have failed to respect and care for creation out of our rebellious and proud behaviour, give us the grace and courage to care for creation and to correct one another in fraternal charity as we also learn to accept corrections when corrected. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen. Have a blessed Sunday celebration.
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