EarthBeat Weekly: Where New York's new archbishop stands on climate, creation care

Where New York's new archbishop stands on climate and creation care EarthBeat Weekly Your weekly newsletter about faith and climate change January 30, 2026   Joliet Bishop Ronald Hicks meets with members of the diocese's Laudato Si' Committee after a 2023 Mass at St. Francis of Assisi Church, in Bolingbrook, Illinois, kicking off the diocesan Laudato Si' action plan. (Julian Brown) By this time next week, New York City will have a new archbishop. Bishop Ronald Hicks of Joliet, Illinois, is set to be installed as the 14th archbishop of the New York Archdiocese Feb. 6 inside St. Patrick's Cathedral. Much has been reported already on Hicks and his background, as he will become the leader of perhaps the nation's most prominent archdiocese and will succeed Cardinal Timothy Dolan who in his 17 years in the Big Apple has attracted passionate critics and supporters alike.  Today at EarthBeat, I reported on Hicks' background around creation care and what kind of archdiocese he'll be entering when it comes to acting on Pope Francis' 2015 encyclical "Laudato Si', on Care for Our Common Home." Under Hicks, the Joliet Diocese in 2023 enrolled in the Laudato Si' Action Platform, the Vatican initiative offering Catholic institutions a roadmap for implementing the encyclical's teachings. Hicks also participated an ecclesial meeting last year on ingraining Laudato Si' more widely in the U.S. church. So far, 30-plus U.S. dioceses have enrolled in the Vatican platform. "We are each called to protect our common home according to our ability and means," Hicks wrote in an introductory letter to Joliet's Laudato Si' plan. He invited all Catholics "in a new dialogue on Care for Creation for future generations in our diocese, so that they too can enjoy the natural beauty and splendor of our local prairies, wetlands, and woodlands; our great Lake Michigan and mighty Mississippi River; and our cities, suburbs, and farming communities." In New York, Hicks will find church engagement around creation care primarily on two fronts: grassroots parish efforts and the archdiocesan energy department. The New York Metro Catholic Climate Covenant, which began in 2014 shortly after the global People's Climate March, has activated Catholics in parishes and at the grassroots, organizing creation liturgies, creating ecological resources and mobilizing advocacy efforts at the state capital. It has worked in tandem with an informal care for God's creation committee that reports to the archdiocese.  The New York Archdiocese has been particularly active in energy upgrades, led by an energy department that is a rarity in U.S. dioceses. It has conducted energy audits at more than 300 buildings, facilitated 13 solar installations (primarily at schools) with four more in process, and is on track to exceed its goal of reducing its total energy costs by 10%, or approximately $40 million annually. "I think Archbishop-designate Hicks is going to come in, from an energy standpoint, to a well-oiled machine, which we weren't 10 years ago when we started," Martin Susz, the archdiocese's director of energy management, told me. Still, he and others sense much more can be done in New York, which is detailed in the story.  Read more: NY Catholics hope new archbishop Hicks will continue Laudato Si' efforts   What else is new on EarthBeat:   Doomsday Clock now at 85 seconds to midnight; 'failure of leadership' faulted by Gina Christian, OSV News The message of the clock "cannot be clearer," said Alexandra Bell, president and CEO of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, which was founded in 1945 by Albert Einstein, J. Robert Oppenheimer and University of Chicago scientists who developed the first atomic weapons. Read more here »   In Africa, religious sisters step in as climate crisis deepens for the poorest by Doreen Ajiambo As religious sisters and others respond on the front lines, communities across Africa bear the cost of global delays on climate action. Read more here »   'Why is this my problem?': a Jesuit guide to teach high schoolers about eco-citizenship by Russell Fiorella "If information alone cannot cultivate eco-citizenship, then teachers must rethink their approach," writes Russell Fiorella. Read more here »   Cardinal Parolin meets with Danish king, prime minister amid tensions over Greenland by Junno Arocho Esteves, OSV News Cardinal Pietro Parolin, Vatican secretary of state, concluded a two-day visit in Denmark with a meeting with the country's king and foreign minister as tensions between Europe and the United States still loom. Read more here »   Russia aims to 'freeze' Ukrainians, prelate says; missile attacks turn Kyiv into 'cold trap' by Katarzyna Szalajko, OSV News Russia's latest missile strikes on Kyiv and other Ukrainian cities were aimed deliberately at civilians and civilian infrastructure and bear clear signs of crimes against humanity, Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk said, as Ukraine enters another week of winter fighting. Read more here » What's happening in other climate news: Yes, climate change can supercharge a winter storm. Here's how. —Matt Simon for Grist Trump's biggest climate rollback stalls over fears it will lose in court —Jake Spring for the Washington Post EPA plan would begin rolling back 'good neighbor' rule on downwind pollution from smokestacks —Matthew Daly for the Associated Press Fourth wind farm blocked by Trump is allowed to resume construction —Rachel Frazin for The Hill Trump's grant terminations upheld by Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals —Lisa Sorg for Inside Climate News Despite Trump, renewable energy keeps surging —Barbara Grady for Yale Climate Connections One of the worst parts of owning an EV is quickly getting better —Shannon Osaka for the Washington Post Dutch government is ordered to protect residents on Caribbean island of Bonaire from climate change —Mike Corder for the Associated Press Final Beat: All corners of the country have turned attention toward Minneapolis in the past week, after the second U.S. citizen protesting the Trump administration's immigration crackdown was shot and killed by a federal agent on Jan. 24. Along with numerous bishops, U.S. Catholic environmental groups have spoken out against the violence and the administration's increasingly aggressive deportation campaign.  The Minnesota chapter of the Laudato Si' Movement said in a sign-on letter that "we uphold the dignity of all of God's creation, very much including that of every human being, created in the image and likeness of God. We oppose this unjust treatment of our communities and the indiscriminate mass deportation of people." They called on Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents to fully withdraw from the state, and for Catholic leaders to stand firmly with immigrants. In its own statement, the Catholic Climate Movement said that although immigration is not its central focus, "the defense of human dignity is inseparable from our work. The fate of migrants, the lives lost to state violence, and the health of our planet are bound together by a single moral truth: every person matters. All is connected." You can follow all of NCR's coverage of the social unrest in the Twin Cities here. As always, thanks for reading EarthBeat.   Brian Roewe Environment Correspondent National Catholic Reporter broewe@ncronline.org     Featured Advertisers   Looking to Hire? Offering Retreats? Selling Books? Place an Ad in NCR's Online Classified Section for Only $75 per Month!   Advertisement