Tag Archives: #ClimateDebtJustice

Catholic bishops from Latin America, Africa and Asia demand climate justice

by Jim Hodgson

In a new document, Catholic church leaders from across the Global South blasted the “openly denialist and apathetic stance” of “so-called elites of power” in the industrialized world who pressure their governments to back away from much-needed mitigation and adaptation measures.

Preparing for the next United Nations climate change gathering, COP30, which will take place in November in Brazil, conferences of bishops from Asia, Africa and Latin America (FADM, SECAM and CELAM respectively) published a joint document entitled A call for climate justice and the common home: ecological conversion, transformation and resistance to false solutions. (You can download the document here.)

It’s the first time the three regional bodies have created a joint statement. The document offers an expansive vision for the U.N. climate conference. “At COP30, we demand that States take transformative action based on human dignity, the common good, solidarity and social justice, prioritising the most vulnerable, including our sister Mother Earth,” the bishops said.

They described the U.N. climate gathering as a moment for the church “to reaffirm its prophetic stance.”

Part of the 32-page document states:

Our demand

The climate crisis is an urgent reality, with global warming reaching 1.55°C in 2024. It is not just a technical problem: it is an existential issue of justice, dignity and care for our common home.

The science is clear: we must limit global warming to 1.5°C to avoid catastrophic effects. We must never abandon this goal. It is the Global South and future generations who are already suffering the consequences.

We reject false solutions such as ‘green’ capitalism, technocracy, the commodification of nature, and extractivism, which perpetuate exploitation and injustice.

Instead, we demand:

Equity: Rich nations must pay their ecological debt with fair climate finance without further indebting the Global South, to recover losses and damages in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean, and Oceania.

Justice: Promote economic degrowth and phase out fossil fuels, ending all new infrastructure and properly taxing those who have profited from them, ushering in a new era of governance that includes and prioritises the communities most affected by the climate and nature crises.

“I am raising a voice that is not mine alone, but that of the Amazonian peoples, of the martyrs of the land—we could say of the climate—and of the riverside, Indigenous, Afro-descendant, peasant and urban communities,” said Cardinal Jaime Spengler, archbishop of Porto Alegre in southern Brazil and president of CELAM. He was speaking at a news conference July 1 at the Vatican.

Vatican News reported that Canadian Cardinal Michael Czerny, prefect of the Vatican’s human development office, spoke spontaneously in the news conference to point to the document’s connection to the legacy of Pope Francis. “Ten years ago, I wonder if there is anyone who could have imagined this press conference as a fulfilment and implementation of Laudato si’. This is an extraordinary expression of what Pope Francis has called for and what Pope Leo is continuing to underline and call. I am grateful,” he said.

WCC begins Ecumenical Decade of Climate Justice Action

In Johannesburg ten days earlier, the World Council of Churches launched its Ecumenical Decade of Climate Justice Action.

During a plenary session June 21 of the WCC central committee, church leaders from six continents shared reflections and urged action for climate justice.

The plenary emphasized the biblical concept of jubilee as a framework for systemic transformation—a key foundation of the Ecumenical Decade. Speakers called for churches to move beyond charitable responses toward addressing root causes of climate injustice, particularly the disproportionate impact on vulnerable communities.

“Our lifestyle consumes 1.8 times what Earth can renew. Economic transformation must begin in the heart; theology must shape discipleship and discipleship must shape the world,” said Rev. Dr. Charissa Suli, president of the Uniting Church in Australia, during a theological reflection on “Jubilee for People and Earth.”

[When I shared Dr. Suli’s comment on Facebook several days ago, my colleague and friend Mark Hathaway pointed out: “In the Global North, it is more like 4.5 times what the Earth can renew—and even higher in the U.S. and Canada (I think about 6 times). The richest 10-20 per cent of humanity is responsible for most consumption and most GHGs [greenhouse gases] and a mere 100 large corporations are responsible for 70 per cent of GHGs.”

WCC has held previous ecumenical decades in the past, including The Ecumenical Decade of the Churches in Solidarity with Women (1988-1998) and The Ecumenical Decade to Overcome Violence (2001-2010).

Disappointment and fury in the wake of failed climate talks—and hope for the road ahead

by Jim Hodgson

“I am infuriated to come home to the aftermath of six typhoons that have struck the Philippines in the space of just four weeks with basically zero gains from COP29,” said Patricia Mungcal, a young climate advocate who serves as humanitarian manager with the National Council of Churches in the Philippines. 

“I will be telling thousands of Filipino families who were devastated by these strong typhoons that world leaders have left us to suffer the heaviest impacts of the climate crisis and disregarded our demands for finance and reparations. This failure to address loss and damage is a grave disregard of our human dignity and rights. We charge this failure of COP29 to the moral bankruptcy of the rich, polluting nations.”

News from Philippines and (right) Patricia Mungcal (screenshot from WCC video)

At the recent climate conference in Baku, Azerbaijan, world leaders failed miserably in their response to the climate crisis and its consequences. Of the $1.3 trillion of climate finance that independent experts estimate will be required annually by 2030, the UN climate conference agreed to provide just $300bn every year – by 2035 (Progressive International newsletter, Dec. 3).

Meanwhile, governments around the globe (including Canada) are still ploughing billions of dollars into fossil fuel subsidies to shelter citizens from higher energy costs, but that comes with a fiscal burden and impedes the goal of reducing overall use.

And Philippines had six typhoons. In the Canadian Rockies, Jasper townsite burned—just days after I had written about climate disasters in British Columbia.

What is to be done?

More often now, we are seeing the connection between the climate crisis and the growing indebtedness of the so-called “highly indebted poor countries” (HIPC). And proposals for a new international financial architecture are once again getting attention. 

In June, Pope Francis pressed leading economists and world finance ministers to support new mechanisms to ease foreign debt, lamenting that “poorly managed globalization” has deprived millions of people of a “dignified future.”

“Ecological debt and foreign debt are two sides of the same coin that mortgages the future,” the pope said. “For this reason, dear friends, the Holy Year of 2025, to which we are heading, calls us to open our minds and hearts to be able to untie the knots of the ties that strangle the present, without forgetting that we are only custodians and stewards, not masters.”

The focus of this Jubilee Year is gaining ecumenical and inter-faith support. In Canada, KAIROS will lead a Canadian Ecumenical Jubilee campaign, in step with global debt relief efforts. “These are inspired by the Jubilee tradition from the Book of Leviticus. Rooted in faith, Jubilee calls for the release of debts, liberation from servitude, and the return of seized lands—principles that resonate deeply in today’s world,” says KAIROS. This campaign aims to:

  • Cancel unjust debts. 
  • Establish a UN-led mechanism for debt resolution. 
  • Prevent future cycles of crippling debt.

The 2025 meeting of G7 (leaders of the richest countries) will be held June 15-17 in Kananaskis, Alberta (southwest of Calgary).

“Confronting threats to the living planet.” Photo: Valter Muniz, WCC)

A “Manual for Mutiny”

The global Progressive International network, meanwhile, is presenting a Program of Action on the Construction of a New International Economic Order. It speaks of a “polycrisis”—the combination of the “old crises of debt, dependency and under-development” combined now with “an accelerating crisis of climate to threaten not only the developmental prospects of the South—but also, in the case of many small island states, their very existence.”

The Program of Action offers nearly three dozen measures across five broad sections: to leverage the South’s natural wealth, labor power, and collective voice in order to extract concessions from Northern partners; to bolster the sovereign development agenda by building Southern alternatives to Northern institutions; and to pool Southern knowledge, resources, and ingenuity in service of a whole that is greater than the sum of its parts.

To that, I would add: Systemic failure demands system change.

What you can do

Keep an eye on KAIROS, of course, and on Development and Peace-Caritas Canada for ways to get involved in the new Jubilee campaigns.

I also want to share with you some suggestions from Katharine Hayhoe, a Canadian atmospheric scientist whose research focuses on understanding the impacts of climate change on people and the planet.

“For climate action to happen at scale, conversations have to move beyond international summits to what’s happening in our communities, our workplaces, and our organizations. And there, change isn’t something we wait for. It’s something we catalyze,” she wrote after COP29.

She suggests starting conversations “about climate solutions where you work or study. Ask what your organization is already doing, and what more it could do—and share that with people around you, particularly those who can make decisions.”

That will be especially important as Canadians vote in a federal election in 2025, and as one party opts for simplistic slogans over serious conversations about climate policy.

Visiting scenes of climate disaster and getting ready for the next one

Contrasts: trees near Osprey Lake between Summerland and Princeton, and trees east of Spences Bridge, July 15, 2024.

by Jim Hodgson

David, Kamill and I headed out by car last Monday for a quick visit to a small patch of territory northwest of our Okanagan home where a forest fire and an extreme flood wrought havoc just months apart in 2021. 

We drove west from Summerland on a beautiful mountain route that follows an ancient Indigenous trail—later part of the Kettle Valley Railroad and now a bike path—to just north of Princeton. Then we turned north to Merritt. From there, we followed the Nicola River northwest on Highway 8.

Left: Southern British Columbia watersheds: the Okanagan valley is in the Columbia watershed; the Nicola and Thompson rivers are in the Fraser watershed.
Centre: our route (the inset shows where the Thompson enters the Fraser at Lytton).

On Nov. 14 and 15, 2021, an atmospheric river brought an unprecedented amount of rain to southern British Columbia. All highways leading east from Vancouver and into the province’s Interior were blocked by floods or landslides. Princeton and Merritt were among many communities flooded.

The Nicola valley was particularly hard hit. It’s a narrow valley, and areas along both sides of the river were farmland. It’s home to the Nooaitch, Shackan and Cook’s Ferry First Nation communities and to their settler neighbours. The flood destroyed homes, farms, the old rail bed and parts of the highway. You can see the devastation of the Nicola valley in a Globe and Mail photo essay or in a B.C. highways department video. In November 2022 after a year of work, the highway re-opened with partial repairs. 

As we drove towards Spences Bridge, we also passed through an area severely damaged in a forest fire some years ago. At the same time, we could see a new fire spreading on a mountainside ahead of us above the Thompson River—likely what came to be called the Shetland Creek fire.

We had lunch in a nice little restaurant called The Packing House in Spences Bridge—just next to the Baits Motel. We drove south on Highway 1 (the Trans-Canada) along the Thompson River to its confluence with the Fraser River. 

And here we came to Lytton, the town of 3,000 people that was destroyed by a wildfire on June 30, 2021. Back in the late 90s, David and I began stopping here occasionally on trips to or from Vancouver. (We like to vary our routes.) It was a lovely town. It had a museum about the history of Chinese migration to the area—and its creator hopes to rebuild. Elsewhere in town, there is more construction: signs that the community will recover.

As we observed how the blue Thompson flows into the muddy Fraser, we could see a helicopter collecting water to drop on another fire burning in the mountains across the river.

We drove home via Ashcroft, whose residents are now on evacuation alert because of the Shetland Creek fire. After passing the massive tailings pond of the Highland Valley Copper Mine—a disaster of a different sort—we returned to Merritt and took the Okanagan connector highway to Peachland, and then turned south on Highway 97 back to Summerland. We drove about 600 km that day.

Of flood and fire

On Tuesday, Toronto had another “once-in-a-century” rainstorm after previous ones in 2005, 2013 and 2018. That day, we were back on Highway 97 as we drove Kamill to the airport in Kelowna for the trip home to Ottawa.

On Wednesday, a wildfire south of Peachland closed Highway 97 for most of the day. Traffic was later restricted to “single-lane alternating” (a phrase I am getting used to) and fully re-opened Friday afternoon.

As the week progressed (and U.S. climate-change deniers held their party’s convention in Milwaukee), I gathered some stories of effects of the climate catastrophe elsewhere in the world. (I did this in post back in January as well.)

These AP stories were published June 20, the summer solstice. Eight days later, Hurricane Beryl formed in the Atlantic Ocean just east of the Caribbean’s Windward Islands. In just 10 hours, it jumped to Hurricane 4 level before striking Grenada, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, and other islands before easing as it moved west across the Caribbean, the Yucatan peninsula and south Texas.

Back in April, U.N. secretary general Antonio Guterres warned that “we cannot replace one dirty, exploitative, extractive industry with another” as we reshape how we power our societies and economies. Some developing countries have large reserves of “critical minerals” such as copper, lithium, nickel and cobalt. But they “cannot be shackled to the bottom of the clean energy value chain. The race to net zero cannot trample over the poor.”

In May, Raúl Zibechi, longtime observer of the role of social movements in processes of political change in Latin America, warned that the climate crisis cannot be stopped. Politicians won’t act for profound change; those who prefer wars over struggles for peace won’t change. His suggestion is that impoverished or otherwise marginalized peoples (“los de abajo”) build collective “arks.” The rich and powerful (“los de arriba”) already have theirs. The example he points toward is that of the Zapatista movement in Mexico’s southern Chiapas state, where for 30 years Indigenous communities have been living in a mostly self-sufficient and self-governing way.

Summers were always hot in the Fraser Canyon and up along the Thompson River towards Kamloops, just as they are where I live in the Okanagan valley. But it feels different now. There were always forest fires, but I don’t remember living in dread of them or having to put up with the long smoky days we have now. In the winter, there were cold spells, but I don’t remember the peach and grape crops being wiped out as has happened this year.

We are putting our emergency kit together (as we did last year) and placing all the important documents in one metal box. North American-style, I suppose: it’s an individualist sort of “ark.” We’re okay with having to take these steps. But we’re also talking about the election in B.C. later this year and a likely national one next year. How do we recover momentum for the dramatic changes necessary to carve a new way forward?