Oblates Call on California Governor to Sign Law Recognizing a Human Right to Water

September 23rd, 2009

Four Oblate priests in Los Angeles wrote Governor Schwarzenegger urging his support for AB 1242, the Human Right to Water Act of 2009. The priests minister to some 12,000 parishioners in the Archdiocese of Los Angeles.

The priests said “We believe that access to safe, affordable and clean water is a human right, and no one should be denied this right because of being poor.”

Calling it a matter of justice, they referred to “Californians who are among the poor and marginal who often do not have access to safe and affordable water for drinking, bathing and cleaning.” They cited Pope Benedict who has called for the recognition of water as a human right.

Recently, the Pope wrote in the encyclical Caritas in Veritate:

The right to food, like the right to water, has an important place within the pursuit of other rights, beginning with the fundamental right to life. It is therefore necessary to cultivate a public conscience that considers food and access to water as universal rights of all human
beings, without distinction or discrimination [65].

Read the letter here.