Par Margaret Lynch, coordinatrice Justice et Paix, GSIJP
“Coal is the liver of Mother Earth. It needs to stay in her body for her to be healthy.”
— Roberta Blackgoat, Navajo Elder
Climate change is no longer just an environmental issue — it is the defining human rights crisis of our time. Each year, we witness more frequent and severe climate disasters: floods, droughts, wildfires, and extreme weather events that are driving food insecurity, displacing communities, and creating a growing wave of climate refugees.
At the heart of this crisis lies the continued use of fossil fuels.
Au cours des 59th session of the U.N. Human Rights Council, Elisa Morgera, the Special Rapporteur on human rights and climate change, presented a powerful report urging a rapid global shift away from fossil fuels — the primary driver of climate change.
«The interlinked, intergenerational, severe and widespread human rights impacts of the fossil fuel life cycle, coupled with six decades of climate obstruction, compel urgent defossilisation of our whole economies, for a just transition that is effective, human rights-based and transformative,” she wrote.
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(Watch Elisa Morgera’s statement in the video above and read the full report here)
Morgera’s report also warns that the fossil fuel industry has actively worked to obscure the connection between fossil fuel use and the worsening climate events we now face. She calls on governments to ensure public access to this critical information, ban fossil fuel advertising, and prohibit new fossil fuel licenses.
This marks a turning point. Historically, climate advocacy and human rights work were treated as separate spheres. Fossil fuels, for example, have never before been explicitly named in a Human Rights Council resolution. Today, it is increasingly evident that this division no longer serves us.
In fact, transitioning away from fossil fuels may be the single most impactful action states can take to fulfill their human rights obligations. The U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child has emphasized that states carry extraterritorial responsibilities — they can be held accountable when their actions (or inaction) harm children in other parts of the world.
Climate change, driven by fossil fuels, clearly jeopardizes the right of every child to a safe, healthy, and happy future.
Our Good Shepherd Response
As Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd, we deeply commit ourselves to address climate change — recognizing that caring for our common home and caring for the most vulnerable are inextricably linked. Notre Position Paper on Integral Ecology calls us to acknowledge that “ecological degradation and suffering of peoples and life forms across the globe are entwined; they are one phenomenon.”
We cannot ignore that those most affected by climate change are often those already marginalized by economic and social injustice — the very people we serve through our Good Shepherd mission of reconciliation and healing. Women, girls, children, indigenous communities, and those living in poverty bear the heaviest burden of climate impacts while contributing least to the problem.
Our spiritual foundation teaches us that reconciliation with our Earth calls for new consciousness, new identity, and new behaviors centered on the kinship of all Creation. As Pope Francis reminded us in Laudato Si’, we need “a new ecological approach that can transform our way of inhabiting the world, our lifestyles, our relationship with the Earth’s resources and, in general, our way of looking at humanity and of giving life.”
Un Appel à l'Action
We all have a role to play in pushing for a just and human rights-centered response to climate change. Here’s how:
- Educate yourself and others about the role fossil fuels play in driving climate change and human suffering.
- Advocate: If you prepare submissions for UPRs or treaty bodies (e.g. CRC, CEDAW), include strong language calling for the defossilisation of our economies.
- Mobilize: Join and support the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty Initiative — as individuals, organizations, or provinces. Encourage others to do the same.
We cannot wait for others to act. As Good Shepherds, we are called to be voices for those without a voice — including our Earth itself and future generations who will inherit the consequences of our choices today.
When we care for our common home, we care for the most vulnerable among us!
