Pope Prioritises 'Saving the Ocean' Over Vatican Abuse Scandal
The Pontiff on Saturday called for an environmentalist to clear up oceans
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Pope Francis's recent attention to the “repugnant crimes” of pedophile sex abuse within the Vatican, namely that of Cardinal Theodore McCarrick has been short-lived as he focuses on 'ocean pollution and plastic waste.
The Pontiff on Saturday called for an environmentalist to clear up oceans threatened by plastic waste and insisted on drinking water be a 'basic right.'
“We cannot allow our seas and oceans to be littered by endless fields of floating plastic,” the pontiff said in a message on the fourth World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation.
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“Sadly, all too many efforts fail due to the lack of effective regulation and means of control, particularly with regard to the protection of marine areas beyond national confines.”
“Our world owes a great social debt towards the poor who lack access to drinking water, because they are denied the right to a life consistent with their inalienable dignity,” he said.
Pope Francis recently urged governments across the world to save the earth from human-inflicted global warming, warning climate change is about to turn the world into “rubble, deserts and refuse”.
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The Pontiff said that humans have created an unsustainable environment were development and rampant consumption can no longer be sustained by the earth.
Francis made the appeal at a Vatican conference which marked the third anniversary of his landmark environmental encyclical Praise Be.
The document, meant to spur action at the 2015 Paris climate conference, called for a paradigm shift in humanity’s relationship with Mother Nature.
In his remarks, Francis urged governments to honor their Paris commitments and said institutions such as the IMF and World Bank had important roles to play in encouraging reforms promoting sustainable development.“
There is a real danger that we will leave future generations only rubble, deserts and refuse,” he warned.
The Paris accord, reached by 195 countries, seeks to avoid some of the worst effects of climate change by curbing global greenhouse gas emissions via individual, non-binding national plans.
