ADDIS ABABA, Ethiopia (Sept. 7, 2025) – In a powerful declaration from the Africa Climate Summit, the Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM) has framed the escalating climate crisis as a dual “moral and ecological emergency,” demanding that the world’s wealthiest nations honor their climate finance obligations to a continent suffering disproportionately from a problem it did not create.
The statement, delivered from the highland sanctuary of Addis Ababa, underscores a stark injustice: Africa endures the most severe consequences of climate change, including crippling droughts, devastating floods, and widespread desertification, while contributing less than 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions.
”We cannot continue to make excuses,” the bishops declared, echoing the language of Pope Francis. “What is needed is courage and determination to move away decisively from fossil fuels.”
A Call for Climate Justice and Self-Determination
The bishops firmly rejected Africa’s role as a passive victim, insisting the continent must be “a full architect of its ecological future.” They championed rural communities, rich in indigenous knowledge, as “laboratories of integral ecology” capable of guiding sustainable development.
SECAM advocated for solutions that “integrate social equity, human dignity, and creation care,” explicitly warning against “short-term profit or false solutions” that could harm communities. The statement strongly endorsed renewable energy, particularly decentralized solar power, as key to unlocking Africa’s potential, creating jobs, and alleviating energy poverty.
Demanding Financial Accountability
In one of its most forceful sections, the statement directly challenged industrialized nations to repay their “ecological debt” through transparent and accessible climate finance. SECAM demanded the swift operationalization of the Loss and Damage Fund, framing compensation for climate-impacted nations not as aid but as a long-overdue obligation.
”This is a matter of justice and solidarity,” the bishops affirmed, noting that vulnerable communities are already suffering devastating impacts from a crisis they did not cause.
Rooted in Faith and Moral Imperative
Grounding their demands in faith, the bishops invoked Pope Francis’s encyclicals Laudato Si’ and Laudate Deum. They quoted from Laudato Si’, noting that “the earth herself, burdened and laid waste, is among the most abandoned and maltreated of our poor.” They framed environmental action as a profound spiritual and ethical duty, inseparable from the mission to protect human life and dignity.
To advance this mission, SECAM pledged concrete actions including promoting “ecological conversion” in parishes, schools, and dioceses; advocating at the upcoming COP30 climate talks for a just transition to renewable energy; establishing an Ecclesial Observatory on Climate Justice; and partnering with ethical organizations to build a green and resilient Africa.
In his closing remarks, Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo, President of SECAM, left no room for ambiguity. “Africa must rise as a moral voice and agent of its own transformation,” he declared. “Justice, solidarity, and care for creation demand nothing less.”
The statement positions SECAM as a formidable moral voice ahead of critical international negotiations, uniting the calls for ecological integrity and social justice into a single, urgent demand for global action.
