News from CAFOD

As we emerge from the pandemic, Pope Francis calls us all, “at this critical juncture, it is our duty to rethink the future of our common home and our common project.”

In the last year and a half, the coronavirus pandemic pushed millions of people around the world into poverty and deepened inequality. The poorest and most vulnerable people in the world are also being hit hardest by the climate crisis.

The climate crisis will affect each and every one of us. It is a crisis that is damaging our world, our common home, God’s creation.

At Harvest Family Fast Day on Friday 1 October, CAFOD is raising money for its Climate Crisis Appeal. CAFOD works with local experts to help people around the world to adapt to the changing climate and protect our common home.

In Brazil, Ivanilde, a mother, a grandmother and a farmer, is on the frontline of the struggle to protect our common home. She lives in a small patch of rainforest in one of the most heavily deforested regions of the Amazon rainforest. More than once, Ivanilde’s home has been ravaged by fires started on land owned by wealthy cattle ranchers and she has lost trees on whose fruits her family rely to survive. Local experts from our church network have stood alongside Ivanilde in legal cases to win rights to stay on the land and she has replanted and restored her land.

All over the world, people are doing their bit to fight the worst effects of climate change. In Ethiopia, water experts supported by CAFOD are helping to build solar powered pumps to help communities struggling with drought. In Bangladesh, CAFOD’s local climate experts are helping people protect their homes and livelihoods from ever more devastating cyclones.

By donating to CAFOD this Family Fast Day, you can help communities affected by the worst impacts of the climate crisis. You can give in your parish or online

Or why not Go Green in October and ask your family and friends to sponsor you to “go cycling, go veggie and go plastic-free”. In this way, we can make choices in our everyday lives that will help to restore our common home and through CAFOD’s Climate Crisis Appeal, support our sisters and brothers overseas.

In November this year, the UK will host COP26, the annual United Nations climate conference. As our Bishops have told us, this conference will bring together leaders who have “the power to make defining choices and policies which will help us build back better, provide for our brothers and sisters, and take care of our common home.” CAFOD is encouraging people to sign its petition to the Prime Minister and urge Boris Johnson to make sure communities most vulnerable to the impacts of the climate crisis are at the heart of the talks.