Ecological encyclical’s relevance reiterated 10 years on

By CathNews New Zealand

June 24th, 2025

Save the Children

Ten years on from Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical Laudato Si’, two Aotearoa Catholic leaders are pointing to its relevance amid the urgency of the environmental crisis.

A reflection by Caritas Aotearoa New Zealand and the Nathaniel Centre for Bioethics stated that, with the encyclical, Pope Francis had placed the teaching on the environment firmly within the body of the Church’s social teaching.

He effectively added to the Church’s social teaching, said Mena Antonio of Caritas and the Nathaniel Centre’s John Kleinsman.

In the encyclical, the Pope pleaded for everyone to listen to the cries of “our Sister, Mother Earth”, the earthly home on whom so much harm has been inflicted.

Ms Antonio and Dr Kleinsman highlighted Pope Francis’ invitation to an “integral ecology”, one which recognises “a relationship existing between nature and the society which lives in it”. They said that this understanding, and the recognition that there is a complex crisis that is both environmental and social, “requires a cooperative, communal and intergenerational approach towards the earth and its resources”.

Almost 20 years ago, New Zealand’s bishops observed the challenges that were present and emerging.

Ms Antonio and Dr Kleinsman noted that suffering and that degradation continues – in New Zealand, but often more acutely in the country’s neighbours in the Pacific.

“As Laudato Si’ observes, an ‘ecological debt’ exists that is ‘connected to commercial imbalances’ between the global North and global South and intrinsically connected to richer countries’ long-term ‘disproportionate use of natural resources’,” they wrote.

Ms Antonio and Dr Kleinsman explained that a Caritas campaign to cancel unjust debts of poorer nations, like those near New Zealand, would provide much-needed financial relief that would allow them to better address climate emergencies.

This initiative is part of helping the world avoid what Pope Francis warned of – the Earth “beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth”.

Referencing the Prayer for our Earth at the conclusion of Laudato Si’, the reflection concludes by emphasising the importance of discovering the worth of each thing through an awareness that everyone is profoundly united with every creature, all on a journey to eternal life.

FULL STORY

Homeward bound? Committing to Laudato Si’ ten years on (Te Kupenga)

Finance experts launch report at Vatican on foreign debt relief | USCCB (Catholic News Service)