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March 22 is World Water Day! March 22nd, 2012

Water is essential for life, and yet increasingly, both in the United States and around the world, water is becoming a scarce commodity. Once largely taken for granted, clean, accessible, affordable water has become a hotly debated and much studied subject.

We have a few things to share on the occasion of World Water Day that may be of interest:

• Bishop Michael Pfeifer, OMI of the Diocese of San Angelo, Texas has written a reflection on water from the perspective of the drought-stricken region of west Texas, which we gladly share here. The article has been published in the San Angelo Standard Times. (Download PDF)
• The UN Millennium Development Goal on access to water has been met, three years early! The goal was to reduce by half the number of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water. According to a report issued today by UNICEF and WHO, between 1990 and 2010, over two billion people gained access to improved drinking water sources, such as piped supplies and protected wells. The related goal on sanitation has yet to be met, but increased attention to this is encouraging.
• Corporations are increasingly examining their water use, measuring risk, and looking at the impacts on local communities and the ecosystems on which they depend. The Oblate Faith-Consistent Investment initiative has focused on water as a key issue affecting the poor, and is engaged in substantive dialogs with major US multinational corporations on the subject. Read the Statement of Principles and Recommended Practices for Corporate Water Stewardship developed by the Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR).

 

UN Report says fresh water is seriously threatened March 20th, 2012

The fourth UN World World Water Development Report says that the increase in world population and global warming, worsening floods and droughts, threaten freshwater resources if nothing is done to improve management.

With a world population exceeding seven billion people, food needs are expected to increase by 70% by 2050, with an increasing demand for animal products requiring huge amounts of water.

The paper was also alarmed by the sharp rise in transnational purchase of agricultural land, which increased from 20 million hectares in 2009 to over 70 million today. It was noted that in the agreements signed between countries, water is never explicitly mentioned.

Richard Connor, the lead author of the report emphasizes that these pressures are likely to exacerbate economic disparities between countries at the expense of the poorest. “Water is the pillar upon which the social and economic development rest.”

Learn more…

 

Bangladeshi Environmental Activists Demand Protection of Dhaka’s Buriganga River March 20th, 2012

Environmental activists on Saturday demanded immediate execution of an earlier High Court order to save the River Buriganga from pollution and encroachment. 
The High Court in 2011 issued a three-point directive to the government to save the river.

Among those demanding action to reverse the severe pollution of the Buriganga was Sharif Jamil, a close collaborator of the Oblates in Bangladesh. Sharif is the Buriganga Riverkeeper, and part of the international Waterkeeper Alliance.

Learn more – read the article…

Torture in Your Backyard: National Religious Campaign Against Torture March 20th, 2012

The National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT) has released a 20-minute film, Solitary Confinement: Torture in Your Backyard, as a resource for parishes and religious congregations to learn about the destructive use of prolonged solitary confinement and to engage people of faith to call for an end to prolonged solitary confinement in their state. The film features several former prisoners discussing the mental harm they endured as a result of being held in solitary confinement and highlights how the religious community in Maine helped secure a seventy percent reduction in the number of Maine prisoners held in solitary confinement. The Missionary Oblates JPIC office is a member of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture (NRCAT)

 

On St. Patrick’s Day, Protect the Irish March 19th, 2012

Rev. Seamus P. Finn, OMI and Eric LeCompte, Director of Jubilee USA – wrote a joint piece on the legitimacy, or lack thereof, of international debt burdens. Their full article can be found on the Huffington Post:

“On the Feast of St. Patrick, there may be no better way to honor the patron of Ireland, who according to legend drove out snakes from the country, than by protecting the Irish people from bailing out a nonexistent reckless speculation bank.

Anglo-Irish Bank (Anglo) financed some of Ireland’s worst property speculators for unsustainable golf courses, hotels and super markets and saddled the Irish people with a massive, unjust debt.

At Jubilee USA Network we know a lot about unjust debts. …”

Read the full blog post.

 

Read more…

 

A Good Friday Reflection: End the Use of the Death Penalty March 14th, 2012

A brochure from Catholic Mobilizing Network to End the Use of the Death Penalty is a resource we recommend to enrich Catholics during this liturgical season of Lent. The brochure offers educational, advocacy and theological reflections about the death penalty for Good Friday, which this year falls on April 6.

Download the brochure (PDF)

 

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