NEWSLETTER INSERTS

A PRAYER FOR PEACE IN THE MIDDLE-EAST

‘O God of all justice and peace, we cry out to you in the midst of the pain and trauma of violence and fear which prevails in the Holy Land. Be with those who need you in these days of suffering; we pray for people of all faiths - Jews, Muslims and Christians and for all people of the land. While we pray to you, O Lord, for an end to violence, the release of hostages, the end to famine and the establishment of peace, we also call for you to bring justice and equity to the peoples. Guide us into your kingdom, where all people are treated with dignity and honour as your children, for to all of us you are our Heavenly Father. In Jesus’ name we pray.  Amen’.

FOR THE CARE OF CREATION

'Environmental justice – implicitly proclaimed by the prophets – can no longer be regarded as an abstract concept or a distant goal. It is an urgent need that involves much more than simply protecting the environment. For it is a matter of justice – social, economic and human. For believers it is also a duty born of faith, since the universe reflects the face of Jesus Christ, in whom all things were created and redeemed. In a world where the most vulnerable of our brothers and sisters are the first to suffer the devastating effects of climate change, deforestation and pollution, care for creation becomes an expression of our faith and humanity'.

Pope Leo XIV, Message for the Tenth World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation

ON BEAUTY

‘As we behold beauty, our heart is filled with a desire for loftier regions about which this beauty speaks and it looks upward with longing…It announces God in its quality…It contains a sursum corda…It awakens awe in us; it elevates us above that which is base; it fills our hearts with a longing for the eternal beauty of God’

Dietrich von Hildebrand, ‘Beauty in Light of the Redemption’, Logos 4, no. 2 (2001):68.

‘Beauty is not an extra it is essential to all existence it is the spender of beauty that makes the true and the good hole wherever it is experienced it gives us a glimpse of the beauty of God therein lies its saving power and this includes the mystery and glory of Christ on the cross the other distortion of divine human beauty and yet it's complete fulfillment’.

Gesa Thiessen, Theological Aesthetics, 6.