Blog posts about/concerning/following CAFOD’s work in Latin America and the Carribean
October 15, 2019
Mauricio López is the Executive Secretary of REPAM – a Catholic Church network CAFOD supports that promotes the rights and dignity of the people in the Amazon. As the Amazon Synod takes place, Mauricio tells us about the threats indigenous communities in the Amazon face and the important role they play in protecting our planet.
Continue reading “Standing alongside indigenous communities”October 11, 2019
Francis from our Theology team reflects on Saint Peter and Saint Paul’s lessons for us during the current Synod on Amazonia.
Continue reading “For a Church walking together”October 9, 2019
Father Peter Hughes is a missionary priest originally from Ireland who has lived and worked in Peru for over 50 years. As the Amazon Synod begins, he tells us about the importance of the Amazon for the whole world.
Continue reading “The defence of the Amazon is at the centre of our faith”October 3, 2019
An historic Synod on the Amazon took place in Rome in October 2019. For our Theology team, Harriet Paterson investigated the hopes of people at the heart of the story.
Continue reading “Hopes for the Amazon Synod”August 29, 2019
School students worldwide have been raising their voices to demand that the climate emergency is addressed with urgency. As Swedish schoolgirl campaigner Greta Thunberg famously said: “I want you to act as if our house is on fire. Because it is.”
At CAFOD, we are privileged to encounter children and young people acting on this issue both in poor communities overseas and in England and Wales.
Continue reading “Young people lead the way on tackling the climate emergency”June 12, 2019
Sarah George is a CAFOD volunteer who moved to the Caribbean with her family as a child. She describes how, after going on to work for the Department of Fisheries in St Lucia, she saw the effects of climate change first hand.
Continue reading “Life in the bullseye of climate change”June 7, 2019
On reading the gospel for Pentecost Sunday, Kathleen from our Theology team reflected on the word “advocate” and what it means to her today.
Based on the gospel for Pentecost Sunday, 9 June – John 14:14-16, 23b-26
“The Father will give you another Advocate to be with you forever.”
Jesus told his disciples they would never be alone. The Holy Spirit, the Advocate, would always be with them.
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For fans of TV courtroom dramas, the word “advocate” may well evoke visions of efficient-looking and aggressive-sounding be-wigged barristers. But what it brings to my own mind is the many times I hear the word “advocacy” being used, here in the CAFOD office in London.
Continue reading “Pentecost reflection: The Holy Spirit, our Advocate”May 21, 2019
Allie Phillip leads Caritas St Lucia’s ‘Youth Emergency Action Committees’ (YEACs), which help vulnerable communities be their own first responders when disasters strike.
St Lucia is in the ‘hurricane belt’ of the Caribbean. The YEACs are run by young people who train other community members to be prepared for, mitigate, and manage responses to extreme weather.
Allie also coordinates the Church’s regional emergency response and the network of YEACs in the Caribbean. Hurricane Irma in 2017 was a particularly bad hurricane, killing people and destroying communities in 14 countries.
Here, Allie offers Sam from our campaigns team her reflections on her current work, climate change and young people.
Continue reading ““Our needs back home are being considered””December 10, 2018
Today is International Human Rights Day. Esther Gillingham, CAFOD’S Brazil Programme Officer explains how CAFOD’s partner, Justice on the Railway Tracks is empowering human rights defenders and changing lives in Brazil.
CAFOD are very proud to share the news that our Brazilian partner, Justice on the Railway Tracks was presented with the first ever Human Rights and Business Foundation Award presented at the UN Forum on Business and Human Rights in Geneva on 27th November 2018.
They received the award for their work defending poor communities from the impacts of human rights and environmental abuses by mining companies in the Amazonian state of Maranhao in north-eastern Brazil.
This work included a 13-year long legal struggle which resulted in the landmark resettlement of the Piquia de Baixo community who have been adversely affected by a huge steel plant built right next to their community in the 1980s.
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Continue reading “Celebrating Human Rights Defenders in Brazil”
October 11, 2018
Francis Stewart works in our theology team. In this blog he looks at the links between the two new saints whose lives have such prophetic meaning for CAFOD.
By canonising Oscar Romero and Pope Paul VI together, Pope Francis is surely pointing out to us the connections between two humble yet courageous men. So what links these two great advocates of “a Church of the poor and for the poor”?
Both men have been inspirational for CAFOD’s mission. This is because of what the teachings of one and the life of the other show us about a true encounter with people who are poor.
Find out more about Romero’s life, with our timeline.
Continue reading “Our newest saints: St Oscar Romero and St Pope Paul VI”
