Pope: Duty to Protect Planet, Calls for 'Social Justice' on Resources

Pope Francis on Tuesday said protecting the planet was no longer a choice but a duty and called for a new "social justice" where access to the earth's resources would be based on equality instead of economic interests.

In back-to-back speeches on the third day of his trip to Ecuador, the pope made his first full-court press on environmental issues since the publication last month of his landmark ecology encyclical "Laudato Si.".

Speaking before a group that included indigenous people of the Equatorial Amazon, he also renewed his call for special protection for the area because of its vital importance to the planet's ecosystem.
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"One thing is certain: we can no longer turn our backs on reality, on our brothers and sisters, on Mother Earth," he said in a first speech at the Pontifical Catholic University of Ecuador.
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His choice of Ecuador to make his first post-encyclical speeches on the environment was not casual.

Ecuador is heavily reliant on oil and mining while boasting some of the world's greatest biodiversity including the Galapagos Islands, on which Charles Darwin formulated his ideas on evolution.

The leftist government of President Rafael Correa, which introduced austerity measures after a major drop in oil prices, is walking a tightrope between business and protecting the environment.

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