We care for our common home in our school – because all life is sacred. Our world is a gift from God. Global warming affects the poorest people the worst. In 2015, Pope Francis wrote a ‘letter to the world’ bringing together decades of Church teaching in the encyclical, Laudato Si. This letter begins by reminding us that in his canticle our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us.

However, he goes on: “This sister now cries out to us because of the harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use and abuse of the goods with which God has endowed her”.

Even before this encyclical, our own Catholic Bishops’ Conference had in 2002 already called for urgent action to prevent more damage being done to the earth. “A way of life that disregards and damages God's creation, forces the poor into greater poverty, and threatens the right of future generations to a healthy environment and to their fair share of the earth's wealth and resources, is contrary to the vision of the Gospel.”