Vatican launches campaign to encourage divestment from mining industries

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ROME (AP) — The Vatican on Friday launched a campaign to encourage divestment from mining industries, saying the Catholic Church should invest its money in ways that are consistent with its ecological teachings.

The effort, which also involves other Christian organizations, takes as its inspiration Pope Francis’ 2015 environmental encyclical “Praised Be.” The document, and the ecological movement it inspired, railed against the multinational corporations that pillage Earth’s natural resources, often at the expense of poor and Indigenous peoples.

The initiative is the brainchild of an existing ecumenical network of Catholic and other Christian denominations, the Churches and Mining Network, that is active in particular in Latin America.

The campaign aims to encourage local churches to review their investment strategies and divest where needed, and to share information especially with Indigenous groups about the types of extraction occurring on their lands.

Yolanda Flores, a leader of the Aymara peoples in Peru, teared up at a Vatican news conference describing how Indigenous mothers are left to fear they are poisoning their children because their drinking water has been polluted by extraction runoff.

“The big question is: Who finances this? Who provides the money to poison us?" she said.

Guatemalan Cardinal Álvaro Ramazzini recalled that when he was bishop of San Marcos, the Guatemalan government allowed a Canadian mining firm to explore, and then extract silver and gold from the land. While the project provided short-term employment to the local population, the ultimate winners were the shareholders, he said.

“Was it a legal activity? Yes. Was it an activity that promoted the holistic development of those communities? No,” Ramazzini said. “In terms of distributive justice: were the mining operations fair? No.”

Cardinal Fabio Baggio, the No. 2 in the Vatican’s ecology office, was asked if the Vatican had in the past invested in mining corporations and was now reviewing its strategies. He said he didn't know, but added that whenever such campaigns are launched, it's necessary to “also look in one's home.”

Francis in 2022 formed an investment committee of church and outside financial experts to guarantee “the ethical nature of the Holy See’s securities investments according to the church’s social doctrine and at the same time their profitability, adequacy and risks.”

Last month, the Vatican bank announced two equity benchmarks that conform to ethical Catholic criteria and are aimed at serving as a reference for Catholic investments globally. They are the Morningstar IOR Eurozone Catholic Principles and the Morningstar IOR US Catholic Principles.

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