reGEN is about “caring for our common home”, a principle that underpins everything we do as a community and across all subjects.

reGEN is about understanding that everything is interconnected and that we need to respect and actively care for all aspects of creation, within the Earth’s capacity. This requires fundamental changes to the way we live, act and think on a global level.

As a reGEN School, Catherine McAuley College provides the opportunity for students to be immersed in a culture that:

• has environmental and social justice concerns at the forefront of decision-making;
• fosters the development of knowledge, skills, habits and the courage to serve our common home;
• values concern for nature, justice, society and students’ sense of inner peace.

We want students to consider how their actions affect the environment and others, and to work towards correcting imbalances and injustices in our common home. Many of the reGEN policy actions will be implemented by the students this year and into the future.

Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home

The encyclical Laudato Si’ provides the basis for the reGEN program, which encourages students to care for our environment and reduce our carbon footprint, minimise waste, save energy and water, promote biodiversity and reduce our impact on climate change.

“Education for sustainability is both present- and future-oriented. It’s about learning to design and implement actions for the present, in the knowledge that the impact of these actions will be experienced in the future. In this way it leads to students developing an overall capacity to contribute to a more sustainable future in terms of environmental integrity, economic viability, and a just society for present and future generations.”

The earth and all life on it are part of God’s creation. We are called to respect this gift. We are responsible for taking care of the world we live in and for sharing all the wonders and resources the earth gives us.

Our changing environment prompts us to stop and think about how we live on our planet. We are called to respond and to adopt new ways of living as Pope Francis highlights in his encyclical, Laudato Si’: On the Care for our Common Home. It is the world’s poorest communities who are affected by changes to our planet. All social justice projects should be attentive to environmental concerns and seek to promote care for the earth and its resources.