CV NEWS FEED // Environmental activists interrupted a mass presided by the Archbishop of Turin on Sunday and read excerpts from Pope Francis’ encyclical on the environment Laudato Si’ and his apostolic exhortation letter “Laudate Deum.”
Archbishop Roberto Repole of Turin was celebrating Sunday Mass on December 3 at the Turin Cathedral when a small group of some three activists, who are a part of the environmentalist group “Extinction Rebellion,” interrupted during the homily, according to Italian newspaper La Republica.
La Republica said the activists quoted Laudato Si’, repeating Francis’ call for “a conversation which includes everyone, since the environmental challenge we are undergoing, and its human roots, concern and affect us all.”
“I initially let the activists speak,” Repole said in a statement issued later on Sunday. “Then I asked them to end because the Mass is a moment of prayer and as such must be respected, also and above all by those who declare that they want to operate with respect for everyone.”
“In the seconds of silence preceding the reading, they stood up one at a time and read aloud passages taken from two writings by Pope Francis,” the Italian chapter of Extinction Rebellion said in a statement. “These are the Laudate Si and the Laudate Deum, with which the Pontiff expressed himself forcefully on the gravity of the ecological and climate crisis, analyzing its scientific and political aspects with great depth.”
“The actions of so-called ‘radicalized’ groups often attract attention at climate conferences. In reality, they occupy a void in society as a whole, which should exert healthy pressure, because it is up to every family to think that the future of their children is at stake,” said one of the activists said while she spoke at the Mass.
In his statement after the incident Repole said
I have great respect for those who mobilize for the defense of Creation and welcome the appeals of Pope Francis, I appreciate the commitment in this sense of the Extinction Rebellion activists, but I was sorry that they decided to speak in the Cathedral without first asking me to speak and ask if they could intervene. I would have replied that at Mass we often pray for peace and for the protection of Creation, but the Eucharistic celebration is not a suitable moment to host public interventions.
On Monday a spokesman for Extinction Rebellion told Catholic News Agency that the organization
[does] not have a headquarters nor do we have a central decision-making body. Groups decide for themselves what actions they will take depending very much on local circumstances… As groups do not have to seek “permission” to stage protests, very often we do not know what actions are taken globally.
In a statement on its website, the Italian chapter of the group said the activists “briefly interrupted the Mass in the Duomo” reading passages from the documents “to bring the attention of the faithful to the words of the pontiff on the climate crisis.”
In January of 2022, activists from Extinction Rebellion interrupted a celebration at the Cologne Cathedral in Switzerland, where they also appealed “to church-leaders: put Pope Francis’ message into action.”
