In this section:

• Climate Change
• Genetically Modified Organisms
• Water
• Extractive Industries

Human beings cannot live and thrive outside of healthy ecosystems, yet we consume, plunder and pollute the Earth's bounty as if there were no limitations.

Current U.S. environmental, economic and geopolitical policies hold little regard for our global sisters and brothers, future generations, nor for the other forms of life with which we share this planet. If the United States is to be a global good neighbor, policy decisions must be guided by principles of sufficiency and sustainability that care for and protect the futures of the people and ecosystems with which we share this world.

We are guided by principles of justice, stewardship, sustainability and sufficiency. In noting the care that our Creator put into forming even the smallest of creatures, and the interconnectedness of all life, we are called to share in the act of Creation by walking gently and caring for the world around us.

As stated by Pope Benedict XVI in Sacramentum Caritatis, "The world is not something indifferent, raw material to be utilized simply as we see fit. Rather, it is part of God's good plan, in which all of us are called to be sons and daughters in the one Son of God, Jesus Christ (cf. Ephesians 1:4-12). The justified concern about threats to the environment present in so many parts of the world is reinforced by Christian hope, which commits us to working responsibly for the protection of creation."

Climate Change
Human-induced climate change is the most serious and pressing ecological challenge facing the United States and the world.

And while all of us are affected by the changes taking place, our global sisters and brothers living in poverty and at the margins of society are the most vulnerable and least able to adapt. Yet, they have contributed the least to the greenhouse gas emissions causing global warming.

Climate change raises serious moral and ethical concerns about the distribution and use of our planet's finite resources.

• With only 5% of the world's population, the U.S. emits approximately 25% of greenhouse gases generated by human activity.
• The glaciers in Peru, where most of the population depends on glacier-fed rivers for water supply and food production, are predicted to have all but disappeared by 2015. Meanwhile, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicts that Latin America will have lost half of its arable land by 2050.
• Increased intensity and frequency of storms, flooding and rising sea levels are making small island nations and coastal regions increasingly uninhabitable. The rate of sea-level rise has doubled over the last decade, further threatening Columban mission countries including Fiji and the Philippines.
• It is estimated that there are already between 25-50 million climate refugees. The IPCC has conservatively projected 150 million will have been displaced by 2050.

While there is a role for technology and alternative sources of energy, we must at the same time fundamentally reconsider the lifestyles that we choose to lead, and our levels of consumption and waste to be faithful stewards of creation and ensure a life of dignity for all of our global sisters and brothers. 

For more information, visit www.cafod.org.uk/watch-and-listen to view an interview with Columban Father Sean McDonagh speaking about climate change at a lobby visit at the British Parliament.

Genetically Modified Organisms
"Modern biotechnologies have powerful social, economic, and political impact locally, nationally, and internationally. They need to be evaluated according to the ethical criteria that must always guide human activities and relations in the social, economic, and political spheres.

"Above all the criteria of justice and solidarity must be taken into account. One must avoid falling into the error of believing that only the spreading of the benefits connected with the new techniques of biotechnology can solve the urgent problems of poverty and underdevelopment that still afflict so many countries on the planet."

-Pope John Paul II, Address to Pontifical Academy of Sciences, 1981

The threat posed by genetic engineering to the integrity of creation and the livelihoods of small-scale farmers is of deep moral and social concern to Columban missionaries.

Genetically modified organisms (GMOs) are created by the transfer of genetic material from one organism to another to create new organisms with particular characteristics. The long-term effects of GMOs are poorly understood, but preliminary studies show worrisome trends for health, biodiversity and local community life.

Genetic engineering raises many social concerns, with particularly harmful consequences for local community life. Under patent laws that allow multinational agribusiness and pharmaceutical companies to "acquire" local knowledge and then claim it as their own, local farmers and communities lose control over traditional knowledge of crops, food production and distribution.

Farmers are forced to purchase seeds that, until now, have been shared and stored freely for centuries, thus leaving their security at the hands of these corporations.

Because most of the world's farmers are poor, they cannot afford the fees charged for patented seeds, and are either pushed heavily into debt with creditors or slowly displaced them from their livelihood, often leading to rural, urban or international migration.

In addition to farmer displacement, migration and a monopoly on the world's food system, the fear is that GMOs may be a risk to human health by causing a host of complications, including allergies, new and threatening viruses, some cancers, and respiratory and gastrointestinal reactions.

There has been some research done in this area. While the results are inconclusive, there remain too many health concerns to be able to deem this technology safe for human or animal consumption.

Many environmentalists have reacted strongly against genetically modified (GM) technology because of the potential imbalance it could have on the world's biodiversity. Environmentalists caution that while the use of GMO crops could wipe out or significantly reduce a particular pest or weed for a time, they also can foster resistance in that particular pest or weed or the increase of other pests or weeds not resistant to the same GMO crop.

Therefore, new technology is continually needed to combat the problem, fostering a greater dependence on GMO crops. Many also fear that by cross-pollinating with wild varieties, GMOs could dominate and wipe out essential diversity within species.

There is a heated moral and ethical debate surrounding GMOs, and religious groups are among the loudest voices. Some scientists, environmentalists and religious leaders call for the adoption of the precautionary principle that says that we should not proceed with GM technology when there remains such uncertainty about the possible effects these crops can have on human health and the environment.

Since there so much conflicting data exists about long-term consequences of GMOs, is it not wise to move slowly?

Water

"The right to water, as all human rights, finds its basis in human dignity and not in any kind of merely quantitative assessment that considers water as a merely economic good. Without water, life is threatened. Therefore, the right to safe drinking water is a universal and inalienable right."

-Pope John Paul II, Message on the 2003 World Day of Peace

Access to clean water is a fundamental human right and is essential to all life on this planet. Globally, more than 1 billion people, about a sixth of the world's population, lack access to safe, clean drinking water.

When water is defined as a tradable commodity and source of profit, rather than a fundamental human right, it is the poor who lose out. Problems of pollution, privatization and dams have unjustly made water a luxury for too many members of the global community.

While countless waterways have been poisoned, used as dumping grounds for toxic chemicals and waste, global warming, also triggered by pollution, affects our water supply in a more subtle, but no less menacing form.

In wetter climates, this means more rain and often flooding. In hotter climates, rainfall is declining and deserts are expanding. As agriculture depends upon rainfall, the livelihoods of many of the world's poorest people are at risk.

Large dams, pushed as a solution for clean energy and sustainable development, have grave social and environmental costs. As many as 40 million to 80 million people worldwide, mostly poor farmers and indigenous people, have been displaced by dams, .

As a direct result, many suffer cultural decline, loss of livelihood, decreased access to water, deterioration in overall health and political repression when they demand their rights. At the same time, effects on the environment include the loss of fisheries, decreased water quality, production of greenhouse gases and a decline in the fertility of farmlands and forests.

In response to the increasing scarcity of safe, clean water, corporations and multilateral institutions, such as the World Bank, have sought to push the privatization of water, arguing that setting a price to water will lead to increased efficiency and conservation.

Nonetheless, water privatization schemes around the world have an abysmal history of failure, including skyrocketing prices, water quality problems, deteriorating service and a loss of local control.

As water becomes a commodity, rather than a right, the poor suffer, unable to afford access. Two million people die every year because of water-related illnesses contracted from lack of access to safe, clean drinking water and adequate sanitation.

Water is often referred to as "blue gold," and it is anticipated that future wars will be about obtaining water. Although our planet, like our bodies, is more water than land, only 2.5 percent of that water is fresh water.

As deserts expand, garbage and pollutants are dumped in our waterways, and rivers dry up or are dammed up, water distribution is coming more and more to reflect the vast inequalities in income distribution in our world with the poor pushed even further toward the margins of society.

Yet beyond its environmental, biological and geopolitical significance, water has profound religious symbolism. In the moment of our baptism, we are reborn and reconciled with the Divine through water. Water is, above all, a symbol of life and hope that in its sanctity must be protected and shared as the common heritage of humankind and our world.

Extractive Industries

"The right of life to people is inseparable from their right to sources of food and livelihood. Allowing the interests of big mining corporations to prevail over people's right to these sources amounts to violating their right to life. Furthermore, mining threatens people's health and environmental safety through the wanton dumping of waste and tailings in rivers and seas."

-Catholic Conference of Philippine Bishops
 

Extractive industries, such as mining and oil and gas drilling, have historically inflicted lasting damage to the communities and environments in which they are located. Rarely do poor people or countries benefit from the extraction of these resources, which too often destroy the environment, exploit local labor, displace communities and undermine sustainable development.

The environmental damage caused by the extraction of the Earth's inner wealth has been incalculable. Gas leaks from the Camisea pipeline in Peru, for example, have triggered devastating fires and contaminated rivers, while deforestation in order to retrieve and transport the gas has caused erosion and landslides in one of the most bio-diverse regions on Earth.

Meanwhile, the remarkable biodiversity contained in Chile's forests is being cleared to make way for industrial tree farms, displacing indigenous communities in the process. In the Philippines, cyanide spills from mining operations have leaked into surrounding bodies of water. And in Appalachia, giant earth movers strip away foliage and dirt, pushing the waste into valleys and waterways, and lowering mountaintops by as much as 500 feet to access coal seams.

Serious health and safety concerns for nearby communities and families, as well as for workers, accompany this environmental devastation. Extraordinarily high rates of nausea, diarrhea, vomiting and asthma have been documented among children in mining regions.

Uncontrolled logging and mining activities in the Philippines have caused dozens of landslides each year, burying villages and killing hundreds of people. At the same time, dangerous working conditions inside the mines compounded by weak, unenforced or nonexistent regulations have resulted in increasing miner accidents and deaths, as evidenced in the United States by tragedies at the Sago and Harlan County mines in West Virginia.

Communities are rarely informed of or consulted about the expansion of extractive industries into their lands, and when they resist the intrusion they are met by increasing militarization and repression.

Indigenous peoples have been particularly affected. Pushed off traditional lands to make way for mining operations or gas and oil drilling, or forced to leave anyway as limited water resources are diverted to the mines and what remains is polluted by toxic runoff, traditional livelihoods and cultural practices are undermined.

The Earth and its resources should be respected and used wisely, not exploited without regard to human or ecological consequences. Ironically, it is some of the poorest countries that are among the wealthiest in deposits of oil and gas, gold, silver and copper, as well as other natural resources, such as trees and coral reefs.

These countries and their populations should be able to benefit from this wealth and use it to determine their own path to development. We believe that a more ecologically sound and equitable system of resource management is possible.