Pope Francis met with representatives of the Pan-Amazonian Network. During the meeting, the Pope thanked them for their efforts to spread the faith and raise awareness of the need to care for the environment. He assured them that the encyclical Laudato si' was the fruit of the Amazonian people themselves.
FRANCISCO RODRÍGUEZ
Promoter, Rights of Indigenous Communities
The Pope has told us that what we do is very important and that in addition to this, everything he has proposed to us through Laudato si' was also born from the hearts of the people, of each one of us who live in the territory of the Amazon and who have also had the opportunity to tell him about it.
Members of the delegation noted the importance of the role of women in caring for the Amazon region.
MARLENE YUCUMA
Amazonian Campesina
Women have been more at the forefront in training to show that rural women can play any other role outside of working the land.
GERARDINA CARDOZO
Missionary in the Amazon
Women play a fundamental role in the life of the Amazon. If you look, by inheritance, by trade, we have been caregivers. We were always told “you take care, you take care, you take care.” But this care has grown and matured. Before we were the caregivers of the home. Now we are the caretakers of the great common home in which we all live.
They claim that the Church's attention to this area of the world has fostered the education of the Amazon's inhabitants themselves.
JUAN FELIPE MARTÍNEZ
REPAM Secretary for Colombia
In the meeting with the Pope we also said “the peasants are also the Amazon and take care of the Amazon,” which slightly broke the vision that the peasants are the ones who deforest and destroy the Amazon.
The representatives expressed their gratitude for the encyclical Laudato si' and the apostolic exhortation “Dear Amazonia.” They said that this invitation from the Pope has helped the native people to stop blaming each other and start initiatives to take care of the land for the well-being of the next generations.
