By Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service
[Vatican City -CNS] – If people do not see themselves as “caretakers of the garden of creation, we end up becoming its destroyers,” Pope Leo XIV said.
As the U.N. Climate Conference continued in Brazil, the pope dedicated his weekly general audience talk Nov. 19 to explaining how Jesus’ death and resurrection should lead Christians to “a spirituality of integral ecology,” which seeks the good of the human person and the planet.
Believing in Christ does not isolate Christians from the world and its concerns, the pope said, but rather it motivates them to share with others how faith generates hope and action, including the kind of conversion needed to provide greater care for the poor and for the earth.
Without concrete commitments, he said, “the words of faith have no hold on reality, and the words of science remain outside the heart.”
“If we allow it, Christ’s salvific act can transform all our relationships: with God, with other people and with creation,” Pope Leo said in his English-language remarks.
Christians “must allow the seed of Christian hope to bear fruit, convert our hearts and influence the ways we respond to the issues that we face,” including the pressing issue of climate change and, particularly, its impact on the world’s poorest people.
“As followers of Jesus,” he said, “we are called to promote lifestyles and policies that focus on the protection of human dignity and of all of creation.”
“Christian hope responds to the demands of our time regarding the climate and the environment,” he told Portuguese speakers.
The audience began with the reading of the Gospel of John’s account of Mary Magdalene weeping near Jesus’ tomb, not recognizing the risen Lord, but thinking he was the gardener.
In some ways, Jesus is the gardener, the pope said. “The lost paradise is rediscovered by Jesus,” who, like a seed buried in the ground, rises again and bears fruit.
Belief in the Resurrection and hope for the coming of God’s kingdom “are the foundations for an ecological spirituality and conversion that change history and involve public commitment, placing Christians on the same side as so many people — including many young people — who have heard and felt resonate in their hearts the divine call to care for the poor and for the earth.”
Pope Leo encouraged people at the audience to “invoke the Spirit to help us care, with the same faith, for our common home and for our hearts.”
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As the international community rightly focuses on resolving war and conflict, countries must recognize that “peace is also threatened” by climate change and environmental destruction, the pope said in a message to the Leaders Summit of COP30 in Belem, Brazil – LINK to Article
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Pope Leo XIV sends a video message to particular Churches of the Global South, gathered at the Amazonian Museum of Belém, Brazil, on the sidelines of the COP30 climate conference
‘Creation is crying out,’ pope says in message to COP30
By Cindy Wooden, Catholic News Service
[Vatican City -CNS] – While “creation is crying out” and millions of people suffer the effects of climate change and pollution, politicians are failing to act, Pope Leo XIV said.
As the United Nations Climate Conference, COP30, began its final week of meetings Nov. 17, the pope sent a video message to Christian representatives and activists from the global south who were holding a side event to the conference in Belem, Brazil.
The Paris Agreement adopted in 2015 at COP21 “has driven real progress and remains our strongest tool for protecting people and the planet,” Pope Leo said in the video.
“But we must be honest: it is not the agreement that is failing, we are failing in our response,” he said. “What is failing is the political will of some.”
While Pope Leo did not specify which nations were at fault, the U.S. government was not represented at COP30 because U.S. President Donald Trump withdrew the country from the Paris Agreement.
“True leadership means service, and support at a scale that will truly make a difference,” the pope said. “Stronger climate actions will create stronger and fairer economic systems. Strong climate actions and policies — both are an investment in a more just and stable world.”
“Creation is crying out in floods, droughts, storms and relentless heat,” Pope Leo said.
“One in three people live in great vulnerability because of these climate changes,” he added. “To them, climate change is not a distant threat, and to ignore these people is to deny our shared humanity.”
As government representatives from most of the world’s countries — more than 190 nations registered delegations — struggled to finalize agreements on reducing greenhouse gas emissions and reducing reliance on fossil fuels, Pope Leo told the Christian activists he believed “there is still time to keep the rise in global temperature below 1.5 degrees Celsius, but the window is closing.”
“As stewards of God’s creation, we are called to act swiftly, with faith and prophecy, to protect the gift he entrusted to us,” the pope said.
In safeguarding creation as a gift of God, he said, “we walk alongside scientists, leaders and pastors of every nation and creed.”
“We are guardians of creation, not rivals for its spoils,” the pope said. “Let us send a clear global signal together: nations standing in unwavering solidarity behind the Paris Agreement and behind climate cooperation.”
Despite the challenges, Pope Leo told the activists, “you chose hope and action over despair, building a global community that works together.”
The efforts have made a difference, he said, “but not enough. Hope and determination must be renewed, not only in words and aspirations, but also in concrete actions.”
From November 10 to 21, 2025, a delegation from Development and Peace – Caritas Canada (DPCC) are among thousands of global leaders and civil society organizations in Belém, Brazil, to defend the rights of communities in the Global South and call for ambitious and just climate action. (Image from devp.org) – Read more: LINK
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© OSV News / Our Sunday Visitor, Inc. 2025 – from CNS Vatican bureau, used with permission.
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