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Another New Pentecost? The Holy Spirit and our Theology of Creation

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  01 January 2024

Ashley Beck*
Affiliation:
St Mary.s University, Twickenham

Abstract

In May 2021, at Pentecost, a joint Pastoral letter was issued by the Catholic Bishops Conferences of England and Wales and of Scotland. This letter linked the feast day to the urgent need to care better for creation in the months leading to the G20 summit later in the summer and the COP-26 conference in Glasgow in November of that year. This paper looks at the letter, taking some account of reactions to it, and begins to explore ways in which our theology of the Holy Spirit can inform our theology of care for the created order as a developing part of Catholic Social Teaching. Some ‘footprints’ of the Spirit: First, the witness of patristic theologians encourages us to see rationality pointing to order in creation as a fruit of the Spirit. Second, the picture of unity in diversity formed by the Spirit in the New Testament points to the need for cooperation in our response to the current crisis. The last footprint is urgency: in the scriptures the Spirit's activity is constantly seen as urgent, sometimes in an extreme way. This picture suits the urgency of the current crisis in relation to climate change and biodiversity.

Type
Original Article
Copyright
Copyright © 2022 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers

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References

2 The International Congress of the European Society for Catholic Theology, Osnabrück, 25-28 August 2021, Creation - Transformation - Theology’, https://www.esctcongress2021.uos.de

3 ‘“Watchman, what of the night? Watchman, what of the night?” The watchman answers, “Morning is coming, and also the night. If you want to ask, ask! Come back again!’”

6 See the classic survey of this, Enthusiasm, by Knox, Ronald (Oxford 1951)Google Scholar.

7 Williams, R., Looking East in Winter (London: Bloomsbury 2021) p. 68Google Scholar. Williams refers to sections 16, 34 and 56 of Laudato Si’

9 Acts 2:1 (Nicholas King translation)

10 Ware, K., The Orthodox Way (London: Mowbray 1979), pp 125-126Google Scholar.

11 Ibid.

12 See, for example, Celia Deane-Drummond, ‘The Cry of the Earth’, The Tablet 9 October 2021

13 Section 66.

14 God in Creation (Gott in der Schopfüng: Okologische Schopfüngslehre), (London: SCM 1985), pp. 9ffGoogle Scholar.

15 On the Holy Spirit 38 (PG 32.136B)