Pope Francis on Thursday urged world leaders to heed the Earth’s “chorus of cries of anguish” stemming from climate change, extreme weather conditions and loss of biodiversity.
In a message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, he urged nations to tackle climate change with the same attention as global challenges such as wars and health crises, saying that global warming hurts poor people the most and indigenous.
Francis said rich countries have an “ecological debt” because they are the ones who have caused the most environmental pollution in the last two centuries, disrupting the rhythm of nature.
“Tragically, this sweet song is accompanied by a cry of anguish. Or better yet: a chorus of cries of anguish. First of all, it is our sister, mother earth, who cries out. Prey to our consumerist excesses, she cries and begs us to end our abuses and her destruction,” she wrote.
Emergency services battled wildfires in parts of southern Europe amid brutal heat waves this week, prompting warnings that the fight against climate change needed to be stepped up.
The appeal came a few days before the pope is due to leave for a trip to Canada, where he will meet with indigenous people in Iqaluit, in the Canadian arctic, which is part of the fastest-warming region in North America.
“Exposed to the climate crisis, the poor feel even more severely the impact of drought, floods, hurricanes and increasingly intense and frequent heat waves,” Francis said.
“Likewise, our brothers and sisters of indigenous peoples are crying out. By predatory economic interests, their ancestral lands are being invaded and ravaged from all sides, provoking a cry that rises to the skies.”
Francis repeated an appeal “in the name of God” he made for the first time last year to the mining, oil, forestry, real estate and agribusiness industries to “stop destroying forests, swamps and mountains, to stop polluting rivers and seas, to stop destroying forests, swamps and mountains. stop poisoning food and people.”
The pope, who in 2015 wrote a major encyclical on environmental protection, said the United Nations Conference on Biodiversity (COP15), to be held in Canada in December, would be a great opportunity for an agreement to stop the destruction of ecosystems and extinction. of species.
He said COP15 could build a clear ethical foundation for the changes needed to save biodiversity, support conservation and prioritize vulnerable populations, including indigenous peoples.
He called for “effective implementation” of the 2016 Paris climate change agreement, which aims to limit the rise in global average temperature to 1.5°C.
(Edited by Mark Heinrich)
Source: CNN Brasil
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