September 1^st marks the start of the Season of Creation, an annual ecumenical event lasting until the Feast of Francis of Assisi (October 4^th), and is itself the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation. Pope Francis’ message for today is Hope and Act with Creation. Part of this message addresses Christian contemplative prayer:

Creation itself, like humanity, was enslaved, albeit through no fault of its own, and finds itself unable to fulfil the lasting meaning and purpose for which it was designed. It is subject to dissolution and death, aggravated by the human abuse of nature. At the same time, the salvation of humanity in Christ is a sure hope also for creation, for, “the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and obtain the glorious liberty of the children of God” (Rom 8:21). Consequently, thanks to Christ’s redemption, it is possible to contemplate in hope the bond of solidarity between human beings and all other creatures. (no. 4)

In other words, what we contemplate is often “the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor” (Laudato Si’ 49; Querida Amazonia 8). Indeed, as I have tried to point out, Pope Francis has asked us to consider a twofold eighth work of mercy: grateful contemplation of God’s world, coupled to the resulting action that we take for the safeguarding, restoration, and rejuvenation of that same world of created natures and created nature.

However, since human beings are connected to the world (“everything is connected,” as Laudato Si’ issues as a refrain), the sufferings of the earth and those of the poor especially intermingle. There is a certain fluidity between contemplating the cry of the earth and that of the poor. The two are not separate, just as contemplation of Christ in our neighbour may lead us in and out of contemplation of the Humanity of Jesus and the Trinitarian Mystery in itself. Everything is connected. And that includes loci of Christian prayer.

But as everything is connected, so too is action connected to contemplation. The former flows out of the latter. And the latter is given more breadth and depth by the former.

So, if we come back to this thematic focus of Pope Francis’ for this year’s World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation—hope and act—we find that, while action is one prong of our care for creation, there is also a second prong: to “contemplate in hope the bond of solidarity between human beings and all other creatures.” Contemplation is tied to this hope. Sourcing our understanding of the pangs and sufferings of creation in the words of Paul’s letter to the Romans makes this unavoidable. We gaze in knowing love and loving knowledge, we pierce events and things with a contemplative regard for beauty; and what we find is wonderfulness shot through with tremendous shards of horror: the cry of the earth—and the cry of the poor. But so too, within all this groaning of creation, there is the renewal in Christ. We have hope.

Grateful contemplation of God’s creation may be a spiritual work of mercy, connected to a corporal work of mercy in acting for creation care. But in a sense, this year’s message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation adds something else. Gratitude is ultimately defeated without hope. It will die, because without action for creation, we will not maintain an interest in resting in it and its Creator prayerfully. And action is intimately bound up with hope. The object of hope is, as Thomas Aquinas always says (e.g., Sum. theol. II-II.18.1), an arduous good. And if we’re not going to put that arduous work in, whatever it may be, we will have have not hope, but a dissipating emotional state.

The Season of Creation offers us an opportunity to recommit ourselves to both action and contemplation, in gratitude and in hope. In the coming weeks, I will explore more aspects of this, just like I did last year. There’s no contemplation in the mud without thinking at times of the mud of the earth.