VATICAN CITY (RNS) — As record‑breaking heat waves scorch much of Europe — with triple‑digit temperatures, wildfires and deaths reported — the Vatican on Thursday (July 3) released a new liturgy for the Mass reflecting concern for the environment, offering prayers, readings and hymns that highlight the church’s responsibility to protect the Earth.

This new Mass “can be used to ask God for the ability to care for creation,” said Cardinal Michael Czerny, who heads the Vatican’s Dicastery for Integral Human Development, at a press conference.

The new Mass, Pro Custodia Creationis (For the Care of Creation), was initially ordered by Pope Francis, who made the environment a major theme of his papacy and the subject of his second encyclical, “Laudato Si’,” subtitled “On Care for Our Common Home,” in 2015.  

Pope Leo XIV has signaled that creation care will be a key area of interest for him as well and a point of continuity between Leo and his predecessors on social issues, especially the environment. Leo will celebrate the new Mass privately on Wednesday at the Borgo Laudato Si’, an eco-village Francis commissioned in the gardens of the papal summer residence in Castel Gandolfo.

Pro Custodia Creationis will be added to the existing list of 17 Masses for special civil needs, which also include Masses for the harvest, rain and migrants, and it’s inspired by Francis’ “green” encyclical, which is celebrating its 10^th anniversary this year.

A collaboration between Czerny’s department, which is concerned in part with how climate change impacts vulnerable populations, and the Dicastery for Divine Worship, the new Mass is also inspired by St. John Paul II’s message for the World Day of Peace in 1990, which emphasized the relationship between humanity and creation.

“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,” Czerny said.

At the start of the Mass, the entrance antiphon, the liturgy focuses on creation as a reflection of “the glory of God,” explained Monsignor Vittorio Francesco Viola, secretary of the Vatican’s liturgical department, at Thursday’s press conference.

The celebration culminates in the Eucharist, Viola explained, adding that after Communion, the prayer focuses on humanity’s connection with God, neighbors and the Earth, which was broken by sin according to Laudato Si’.

One reading from the Gospel of Matthew describes how God provides for “the lilies of the field and the birds of the air,” showing that God cares for all of creation. Another reading from the same Gospel tells of Jesus calming the storms. Both readings, Viola explained, focus on Christian believers’ responsibility to preserve the environment and push back against some Catholic interpretations of Genesis as empowering humans to subjugate nature to their own advantage.

Saying “this Mass is a reason for joy,” Czerny said, it “calls us to be faithful stewards of what God has entrusted to us – not only in daily choices and public policies, but also in our prayer, our worship and our way of living in the world.”