{"id":30543,"date":"2015-06-28T14:47:43","date_gmt":"2015-06-28T19:47:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/?p=30543"},"modified":"2015-06-28T14:47:43","modified_gmt":"2015-06-28T19:47:43","slug":"laudato-si-and-liturgical-life-example-1-green-burial-practices","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/praytellblog.com\/index.php\/2015\/06\/28\/laudato-si-and-liturgical-life-example-1-green-burial-practices\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cLaudato Si\u201d and Liturgical Life — Example 1: Green Burial Practices"},"content":{"rendered":"

Since the publication of Pope Francis\u2019s encyclical \u201cLaudato Si\u201d I have been thinking about how best to spell out this beautiful text for liturgical and devotional practices.\u00a0 Some of this is easily done, since the Pope offers his own examples (especially in the section on \u201cSacramental Signs and the Celebration of Rest\u201d): \u00a0pray before meals; go forward singing; commit to Sunday as a day of rest; appreciate the sacraments as \u201ca privileged way in which nature is taken up by God\u201d (# 235).<\/span><\/p>\n

But of course there is so much more, and I invite all of us to help spell out \u201cLaudato Si\u201d for the world of liturgy and life. \u00a0Here is one first example, related to contemporary burial practices (and no, this is not really far-fetched; even St. Francis\u2019s canticle, which gave the encyclical its title, ponders \u201cSister Death\u201d).\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

Did you know that a typical American cemetery is a veritable ecological disaster zone? It is filled to the brim with toxic embalming chemicals (used post mortem on human bodies) and contains close to 1,000 tons of casket steel as well as 20,000 tons of vault concrete.\u00a0 Such a cemetery essentially destroys the ecological balance of the land on which it sits.\u00a0 The Green Burial Movement (more info here: http:\/\/greenburialcouncil.org\/home\/what-is-green-burial\/<\/a>) seeks to change this and return us to older and simpler practices of caring for those who have died and of burying the dead. \u00a0I am deeply committed to these green burial practices (I have a simple pine \u201cshelf-coffin\u201d in my office, for example, that will one day easily transform itself from being a shelf to becoming my coffin, lid included). \u00a0And I was glad to learn that the Diocese of Albany, NY, for example, has a \u201cNatural Burial Preserve,\u201d that is, undeveloped space, at one of its diocesan cemeteries, for green burials.\u00a0 Apparently, there are by now numerous other green cemeteries in the U.S. that not only allow for natural burials but also skip pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizers in the burial ground\u2019s upkeep.\u00a0 Given that I work hard at keeping my carbon footprint low as I journey through life, I am delighted that I will be able to keep my carbon footprint low once I have died. \u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

I thus welcome Pope Francis\u2019s \u201cLaudato Si\u201d not least because I hope that we can have sustained conversations about the changes we have to make in our everyday lives as well as our liturgical and devotional practices in order to respond to the ecological emergency we live in.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Since the publication of Pope Francis\u2019s encyclical \u201cLaudato Si\u201d I have been thinking about how best to spell out this beautiful text for liturgical and devotional practices.\u00a0 Some of this is easily done, since the Pope offers his own examples (especially in the section on \u201cSacramental Signs and the Celebration of Rest\u201d): \u00a0pray before meals; […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_wpcom_ai_launchpad_first_post":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[275,2224],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-30543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-funeralsburial","category-pope-francis"],"yoast_head":"\n\u201cLaudato Si\u201d and Liturgical Life - 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