Sister Damien Marie Savino, FSE, smiles next to her red book cover for 'Learning the Language of Creation: Catholic Social Teaching.'
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"Learning the Language of Creation" with Sr. Damien Marie Savino

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Location: Newman University Church (Dublin, Ireland)

This event takes place in Dublin, Ireland, at the Notre Dame - Newman Centre for Faith and Reason (Newman University Church, 87A St. Stephen's Green). Times are in GMT.

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Sister Damien Marie Savino joins Notre Dame Dublin and the Notre Dame - Newman Centre for Faith and Reason to discuss her new book, Learning the Language of Creation: Catholic Social Teaching and Integral Ecology.

Learning the Language of Creation: Catholic Social Teaching and Integral Ecology by Damien Marie Savino, FSE.

"A vision for realizing the promise of integral ecology and putting it into practice."

In his landmark encyclical on care for creation, Laudato Si', Pope Francis popularized the idea of integral ecology by connecting contemporary ecological concerns and church teachings on creation addressed by Catholic Social Thought. In Learning the Language of Creation, Franciscan Sister Damien Marie Savino, a professor of civil and environmental engineering and earth sciences, frames integral ecology as a pilgrimage guided by a process of listening and learning the language of creation.

In this book, she offers a new way of thinking about creation, human beings, and the relationship between them to realize the promise of integral ecology put into practice.

Sister Damien Marie will be joined in conversation with Mariana Silva, a PhD Candidate in Environmental Engineering at Trinity College Dublin, a Notre Dame graduate (BS Environmental Engineering, '21), a Naughton Fellow (MS Environmental Engineering, Trinity College Dublin, '22), and a member of the Newman University Church Parish Council.

Copies of the book will be available for purchase on the night.

Please note: This event will begin shortly after Taizé (6 - 7 pm), a weekly, ecumenical prayer service at Newman University Church. During Taizé style prayer, you can expect a candlelit church, meditative songs, silence, and readings. Feel free to join the community for Taizé before Sister Damien's talk.

Smiling woman in glasses with short brown hair, wearing a black habit.

Sister Damien Marie Savino is a Franciscan Sister of the Eucharist who holds a doctorate in Civil/Environmental Engineering and masters’ degrees in theology and soil science. Her interdisciplinary research interests include integral ecology and Catholicism, theology and science, technology and faith, ecological restoration, and resilience theory.

Currently she serves as the Melchor Visiting Research Professor in the College of Engineering at the University of Notre Dame, with a concurrent appointment in the McGrath Institute for Church Life. Sister Damien Marie is author of the 2025 book, Learning the Language of Creation: Catholic Social Teaching and Integral Ecology, available from Liturgical Press. She was also an editor and contributor to the 2023 book, Responding to the Global Pandemic as a Systemic Crisis: The Economy of Francesco as a New Paradigm. She has published and lectured widely, both nationally and internationally, on integral ecology, Laudato Si’ and creation care, the integration of science and faith, and questions of technology.