Pope says a revised environmental encyclical will be released Oct. 4, feast of St. Francis of Assisi

By NICOLE WINFIELD
Associated Press

VATICAN CITY (AP) — Pope Francis is planning to release an update to his landmark 2015 environmental encyclical on Oct. 4. That’s the feast of his nature-loving namesake, St. Francis of Assisi. Francis recently revealed he was writing a “second part” to the document “to address current problems” and announced Wednesday he’d publish it Oct. 4. The Vatican spokesman says the update would take into account in particular recent climate crises. The 2015 encyclical “Laudato Si,” or “Praised Be,” is perhaps Francis’ most well-known and important document. In it, Francis called for a bold cultural revolution to correct what he said was a “structurally perverse” economic system in which the rich exploited the poor.