“A Call for Climate Justice and the Common Home: Ecological Conversion, Transformation and Resistance to False Solutions” is the title of the document presented at the Holy See Press Office. The text, drafted by the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM), the Federation of Asian Bishops’ Conferences (FABC), and the Latin American Episcopal Council (CELAM), coordinated by the Pontifical Commission for Latin America (PCAL), stresses that the climate crisis “is not merely a technical problem” but rather “an urgent reality, an existential issue of justice, dignity, and care for our common home.”
To address this crisis, “false solutions such as ‘green capitalism’, technocracy, the commodification of nature, and extractivism, which perpetuate exploitation and injustice, must be rejected.” What is required is “a profound ecological conversion,” a structural change that restores the human person to the centre of their relationship with creation, and which necessarily involves a true paradigm shift in the economic system, “replacing the logic of unlimited profit with integral ecology.”

 The Call of the Churches of the South for COP30

This appeal is being made jointly by the Churches of the Global South in anticipation of COP30, scheduled to take place in Belém, Brazil, from 10–21 November 2025. It calls for “equity, justice, and protection” in defence of indigenous peoples, ecosystems, impoverished communities, and vulnerable groups such as youth, women, and the elderly, explained the speakers at the press conference: Emilce Cuda, Secretary of PCAL, and Cardinals Jaime Spengler, Archbishop of Porto Alegre (Brazil), President of CELAM and of the National Conference of Bishops of Brazil (CNBB); Filipe Neri Ferrão, Archbishop of Goa and Damão (India), President of FABC; and Fridolin Ambongo Besungu, Archbishop of Kinshasa (Democratic Republic of Congo) and President of SECAM.

The document draws inspiration from Pope Francis’ Laudato si’ and from Pope Leo XIV’s call to confront “the wounds caused by hatred, violence, prejudice, fear of difference, and an economic paradigm that exploits the Earth’s resources and marginalises the poorest.” The document, handed to the Pope before the press meeting, outlines commitments the Church intends to undertake: defending the weakest in decisions about climate and nature; promoting systems based on solidarity, “joyful sobriety” and the principles of ancestral wisdom; strengthening an intercontinental alliance among countries of the South; and creating a special “Climate Justice Observatory” to monitor COP outcomes. It also underscores the centrality of education, which is essential to counter “the openly denialist and apathetic stance adopted by the super-rich segments of society, the so-called elites of power.” The text also echoes Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation Laudate Deum (no. 38). Moreover, the document addresses all global actors with specific demands: “Respect the Paris Agreements” by placing “the common good above profit”; transform the economic system towards greater planetary sustainability; and “promote human rights.”

Building Bridges to Avoid Drowning

The local Churches of the South intend to “build bridges among themselves as an expression of catholicity” and also with those outside the Church, for “we seek to reach the hearts of both believers and non-believers,” said Emilce Cuda. The document is therefore “a concrete expression of the ability to overcome divisions and ideologies,” because “either we unite, or we drown together.”

Cardinal Spengler Rejects Green Capitalism

Echoing this, Cardinal Spengler called for the courage to make decisions, “otherwise we endanger the future of coming generations.” For him, the message is clear: “There is no climate justice without ecological conversion, and there is no conversion without resistance to false solutions.” He listed financialisation and commodification of nature, so-called “green capitalism”, and extractive monocultures in mining and energy that sacrifice communities and ecosystems. “Economic interests lie behind these false solutions: is it still possible that climate issues remain the concern of only a few? Conversion has a price to pay.”

The Ecological Debt of Rich Countries

Inspiration, the text notes, can come from a just and communal transition, with youth and women at the centre. But this requires not only defending the sovereignty of indigenous peoples and traditional communities over their territories, phasing out fossil fuels (the 1.5°C temperature increase threshold was already exceeded between 2015 and 2024), promoting solidarity mechanisms, and respecting local cultures, but also a radical economic paradigm shift. “Rich countries must recognise and assume their social and ecological debt as the main culprits of natural resource extraction and greenhouse gas emissions; commit to affordable and effective climate financing that no longer generates debt; work towards an alliance with Southern countries for ethics and justice; create climate governance mechanisms with the active participation of communities; and establish policies for reducing demand and consumption, for degrowth, and for lowering greenhouse gas emissions.” The proposal also calls for policies aimed at reducing demand and consumption, setting degrowth targets, and transitioning towards circular, solidarity-based, and restorative economic models.

Cardinal Ambongo: Africa Impoverished by Centuries of Exploitation

In this sense, “Africa is a significant example,” said Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu. “It is a rich land impoverished by centuries of extractivism and exploitation,” and today, “the continent that pollutes the least pays the price of global pollution. It is therefore contradictory to use profits from oil extraction to finance the transition.”

Finally, Cardinal Neri Ferrão stressed the need for compensation mechanisms, still insufficient, and urged that developed nations “assume their ecological debt, which will reach 192 trillion dollars by 2050.”

COP30 in Brazil thus represents a historic appeal and comes at a decisive moment for humanity, also afflicted by war: “We want it not to be just another event, but a moral turning point,” concluded the speakers presenting the document.

Voir, Les Églises du sud mobilisées pour que la COP30 soit un tournant moral