The Janssen Spirituality Centre in Boronia, Victoria, is looking forward to sunny days ahead, for both visitors and residents, following the installation of solar panels on its roof.

The installation of the panels means that now all three of the larger SVD houses – at the Provincial Centre in Marsfield, Dorish Maru College in Melbourne and now the Janssen Centre – are largely producing their own electricity and requiring less fossil-fuel generated power.

Director of the Janssen Centre, Fr Sunil Nagothu SVD, who has long been a proponent of installing solar panels on SVD property, says the panels will have a two-fold benefit.

“They will obviously reduce our carbon footprint and also help us to become more self-sufficient, self-sustaining and environmentally friendly,” he says.

Fr Sunil says Pope Francis’ encyclical, Laudato Si’, laid out very clearly the Christian responsibility to care for our common home, the earth.

SVD communities across the world are committing to Pope Francis’ Laudato Si’ Action Platform which proposes a seven-step, seven-year set of goals towards preserving and restoring God’s creation which is seen as a vehicle for all human life.

In a video message earlier this year, Superior-General of the Society of the Divine Word, Fr Budi Kleden SVD, said the SVD was committed to playing an active role in addressing climate change and he encouraged Divine Word Missionaries around the world to take concrete action at the local level.

“So, we are playing our small part here at the Janssen Centre,” Fr Sunil says.

“We are a spirituality centre, and eco-spirituality is an important part of all that, so if we’re not doing anything practical for Mother Earth, we have to ask ourselves why not?”

Fr Sunil says the solar panels will also increase the comfort of guests to the Janssen Centre throughout the colder months.

“This is a cold house and now guests can comfortably stay in the house and use the heating, without us worrying about the bills,” he says.

There are plans to change the heating from gas to electricity to further take advantage of the solar panels.

In addition to the practical measures being undertaken to care for our common home, the Janssen Centre will also host a reflection topic on Ecological Conversion during Lent next year.

Theologian Peter Saunders will conduct a four-week Lenten Reflection based on Laudato Si’, entitled ‘Encountering the Sacred in Nature’.

 It will be held over four Saturday mornings during Lent, consisting of two mornings at the Janssen Centre and two Contemplative Walks in Nature. 

“We’re looking forward to the Lenten Reflections,” says Fr Sunil. “It’s a beautiful place here at the Centre, with beautiful gardens and grounds and lends itself very much to this kind of eco-spirituality reflection, being opened to our awareness of God in Creation all around us.”

PHOTOS

TOP RIGHT: Fr Sunil Nagothu SVD with the new solar panels at the Janssen Spirituality Centre in Boronia.

BOTTOM LEFT: The Centre is blessed to have beautiful gardens in which to reflect on God in Creation.