At UN, Francis Pleads for Protecting Environment and Poor
- 9 years ago
In an address to the U.N. General Assembly, Pope Francis exhorted presidents and prime ministers to show leadership in combating climate change and poverty and in protecting refugees fleeing conflicts.
He urged government leaders to take concrete steps "for preserving and improving the natural environment and thus putting an end as quickly as possible to the phenomenon of social and economic exclusion, with its baneful consequences: human trafficking, the marketing of human organs and tissues, the sexual exploitation of boys and girls, slave labour, including prostitution, the drug and weapons trade, terrorism and international organized crime."
Francis also called for providing, among all people, "the minimum spiritual and material means needed to live in dignity and to create and support a family.... In practical terms, this absolute minimum has three names: lodging, labour, and land; and one spiritual name: spiritual freedom, which includes religious freedom, the right to education and other civil rights."
He urged government leaders to take concrete steps "for preserving and improving the natural environment and thus putting an end as quickly as possible to the phenomenon of social and economic exclusion, with its baneful consequences: human trafficking, the marketing of human organs and tissues, the sexual exploitation of boys and girls, slave labour, including prostitution, the drug and weapons trade, terrorism and international organized crime."
Francis also called for providing, among all people, "the minimum spiritual and material means needed to live in dignity and to create and support a family.... In practical terms, this absolute minimum has three names: lodging, labour, and land; and one spiritual name: spiritual freedom, which includes religious freedom, the right to education and other civil rights."