Bishop calls for "Ecological Spirituality" on the Assumption

Carinthian Bishop: Climate change, aggressiveness, wars and inner-church disputes are "challenging signs of our time"

Carinthian Bishop Josef Marketz called for an "ecological spirituality". The offer of faith and the power of prayer as "always effective answers to the challenging signs of our time", he put in the focus of his short speeches at the ship procession on Lake Wörthersee on Monday evening.

As examples of such "signs of the times", the Bishop mentioned "climate change with its catastrophic consequences, the aggressiveness that worries us in communication among people, wars and their consequences that challenge us to solidarity, as well as internal church disputes that weaken and question the mission as Church".

During the 68th ship procession at nighttime, which was also attended by a delegation of the Pontifical Swiss Guard, a statue of the Virgin Mary from the pilgrimage site of Fatima was once again led across Lake Wörthersee. The naval ship "MS Kärnten" and the accompanying ships Loretto and Loreley departed from Klagenfurt, with devotional stops at Krumpendorf, Pörtschach, Velden, Maria Wörth and Klagenfurt again.

In view of the growing scarcity of energy and resources, the Carinthian Bishop called for a rethinking of our way of life in Krumpendorf in the spirit of the "ecological spirituality" demanded by Pope Francis and reminded us of "our great responsibility as a society, but also as a Church". This responsibility also applies to our dealings with one another. Thus, in Pörtschach, Bishop Marketz warned against "new forms of egoism and loss of social sense, which would lead to aggressiveness, insults, verbal abuse up to the destruction of self-esteem and suicide" and called in this context for a "new culture of dialogue in the encounter with God".

Especially in times of war and crisis, Bishop Marketz said in Velden, "the great challenge for all involved is to develop a sense of solidarity". The war in Ukraine, he said, was not the only warlike conflict to plunge people in many parts of the world into misery. "It is often also a war of words that damages our societies," he said. Being for one another and solidarity are therefore "indispensable at this time in order not to disfigure or even destroy the humane face of our society". Since a community of solidarity is only as strong as its weakest members, everyone must "pay particular attention to ensuring that the burdens of acts of solidarity are distributed in such a way that they can be shared by all".

In Maria Wörth, where the ship procession culminated with the renewal of the consecration to the Blessed Mother by Bishop Marketz, the Carinthian Bishop referred to the current challenges of the Church. "The Christian faith is not persecuted or publicly rejected in this country, but it encounters a much greater danger: indifference," Marketz said. In the spirit of the Synodal Process proclaimed worldwide by Pope Francis, the Catholic Church in Carinthia wants to "support and support as many people as possible in their search for faith in a contemporary language" even more in the future. It is a matter of rediscovering faith in Christ "as a path of trust and courage, of love and faithfulness, as a movement in the direction of that future which Christ has opened up and into which he invites us".

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