April 2020
The coronavirus has exposed the fault lines of injustice in our society.
March 2020
Board of directors of the Global Catholic Climate Movement met with Pope Francis. Read here.
September 2019
Join the action
Join the Catholic family taking a stand in the climate strikes
on September 20.
June 14, 2017
Dear Friend,
Laudato Si’ turns 2 on Sunday!
Pope Francis’ encyclical was historic. It has transformed our lives and Church, reminding us that we are to incorporate creation and all of our brothers and sisters into our life of faith.
At GCCM, our mission is to help educate the Church about Laudato Si and provide concrete ways to bring it to life.
So to celebrate the encyclical’s anniversary, we will be doing something special. SShhh…don’t tell, but on June 18th we will be launching a Laudato Si’ Pledge to encourage the millions of Catholics (actually we are 1.2 billion!) to join us in this important ministry of caring for our common home. This pledge will be a concrete way individuals, families, and communities can commit to live Laudato Si.
You can help us spread the word about the encyclical’s anniversary and the Laudato Si’ Pledge by joining our social media Thunderclap.
When you sign up for our Thunderclap, a pre-written post will automatically be published to your Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr on June 18th.
If you are not on social media, don’t dismay. We will be sending out an email next week about the Laudato Si’ Pledge with some ways you can share it on social media, through email, in your parish, or in your community.
Thanks for joining us in this important ministry!
November 30, 2016
Dear Friend,
Advent began on Sunday, November 27.
For many of us, these weeks can be a time of great stress and activity, as we look at our long shopping lists, decorate our homes, and plan holiday meals. As our calendar get filled with events, it can be easy to lose sight of the true reason for the season.
Advent is a time of preparation. A time for creating space in our hearts and in our lives to prepare for the Christ Jesus. This is not just the Jesus who was born over 2,000 years ago in a simple manger in Bethlehem. This is also the Jesus who is waiting to be born in our world right now through hearts of peace, hands of compassion, and acts of justice.
It can be easy to crowd out the space for Jesus through busyness and buying. And yet, when we do that, as Pope Francis reminds us in Laudato Si, the impacts are dire:
“The pace of consumption, waste and environmental change has so stretched the planet’s capacity that our contemporary lifestyle, unsustainable as it is, can only precipitate catastrophes, such as those which even now periodically occur in different areas of the world…We need to reflect on our accountability before those who will have to endure the dire consequences.”(LS, 161)
This Advent, we invite you to make a commitment to Laudato Si-fy your Advent by looking at ways to reduce your consumption.
Some possibilities might be to give meaningful gifts, such as giving the gift of time or to charities (like GCCM!), praying with special Advent reflections, or creating a “reverse Advent calendar.” We have plenty of more ideas on our Advent website and invite you to share with us what you plan to do this Advent on our Facebook page.
See ways to LaudatoSi-fy your Advent
We wish you and your loved ones a blessed Advent as you prepare for the One who brings eternal hope,
Christina and the GCCM team
P.S. Keep your eyes out for an upcoming webinar during Advent with experts to help us explore consumerism more deeply and ways that we might address it.
November 2016
Join our COP22 Webinar from Morocco!
Dear Friend,
Today the Paris Agreement enters into force.
This is historic in scope and degree as over 190 countries (all countries) have pledged to halt the momentum of the climate crisis and end the fossil fuel era.
You are part of this moment: from the petitions you signed and promoted, to the steps you took in climate marches, to the prayers you offered. We offer a deep prayer of thanks for how your single strands of action have woven a tapestry of climate justice.
This couldn’t come soon enough. A recent report shows that the fossil fuel industry continues extracting a massive amount of fuels that will severely disrupt the climate system, when we should instead keep 85% of fossil fuel reserves in the ground to stay below the dangerous threshold of a 1.5C temperature increase. In other words, the world needs to dramatically accelerate the implementation of the Paris Agreement to transition away from fossil fuels and profoundly change the way we consume.
In a few days, GCCM will be in Morocco for the next round of climate negotiations at COP22. We will be representing the Catholic community in the delivery of an interfaith statement to government leaders encouraging them to rapidly increase their climate pledges to reduce emissions to stay below the 1.5 degree threshold.
To give you an inside look of the negotiations, GCCM will be hosting a special webinar on November 14 from Morocco with other climate leaders (see below for list of speakers). This will also be an opportunity for you to learn about hot climate news and get inspired to take bold action for climate justice in the next 6 months.
Register for the COP22 Webinar
In his World Food Day message last month, Pope Francis stated his hope that “the objectives outlined by the Paris Agreement do not remain simply as good words, but rather that they are transformed into courageous decisions able to make solidarity not only a virtue but also a working model in economics, and fraternity no longer an aspiration but a criterion for domestic and international governance.” (Oct 14, 2016)
Let us join Pope Francis in urging our leaders that the Paris Agreement’s words be turned into policies ambitious enough to protect our common home and most particularly the most vulnerable among us.
Thank you for your continued commitment and looking forward to seeing you in the webinar.
God bless,
Christina on behalf of the GCCM team
Launch of the Eco-Parish Guide for Catholic Parishes
The Global Catholic Climate Movement (GCCM) is proud to announce the release of the Eco-Parish Guide for Catholic Parishes. This free guide will be a great resource for your parish to take the next steps in response to Laudato Si’.
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One year ago, Pope Francis released his historic encyclical Laudato Si: On Care for our Common Home. The encyclical issued an unprecedented call to “address every person living on this planet” about the climate and environmental crisis. This transformative and historic document was to influence the Paris Agreement and our Catholic community’s engagement with the ecological issue.
To celebrate it Global Catholic Climate Movement are launching Laudato Si’ Week, June 12-19, a major international celebration of the Pope’s encyclical release anniversary. Their goal is to reflect on the encyclical message and take action to bring it to life. Read more.
Useful resources for communicating the Paris outcome from the Climate Action Network (CAN), a climate network which GCCM recently joined can be found here.
Here also is the statement of Tomás Insua, Global Coordinator of GCCM on the outcome.
“This agreement represents the end of the fossil fuel era, as the Catholic Church has been advocating. The 1.5C target and the goal of net zero emissions enshrines the moral imperative to leave fossil fuels in the ground. This is a meaningful step forward on the path to protecting the poor and most vulnerable from climate change. We are still disappointed with the failure to address some key issues such as climate finance for developing countries and the language about human rights, but we recognize that Paris is a turning point in the conversation on solutions to the ecological crisis that Pope Francis called for in his Encyclical.”
JOIN THE #PRAY4COP21 PRAYER CHAIN HERE