The Amazon is burning: life is dying out.

Dear friends,

what will we, women of WUCWO, do in the face of this scourge that is attacking our planet? Aren’t we "carriers of living water" as we stated at our last General Assembly in Dakar in October 2018?

How can we react to the destruction of our "Common Home" and the mistreatment of the poorest inhabitants of the Amazon basin? I ask myself: what would Mary do in our place when listening to the cry of the aborigines and the cry of the Earth?

The global climate balance is at stake: without the rains that forests attract, nearly 20% of the water we need for our subsistence and the same amount of oxygen production, as well as 10% of biodiversity, is at risk. Several regions of our continents will suffer the consequences of smoke and ashes. Most importantly, more than 500 indigenous peoples have already lost their natural habitat.

Women of WUCWO: we have formally declared that "A HEALTHY PLANET DEPENDS ON ALL OF US." We have set this resolution as a work guideline during the period 2018-2022. It is time to take this responsibility into our hands, with creative determination and greater action.

I am sure that our peculiar sensitivity and our feminine intuition will allow us to find the best that our organisations can do, according to our own reality. I only present, as a proposal, some possible responses:

- Let us accompany with our prayers the prophetic gesture of the Pope and his enormous effort for the Synod "Amazonia: New Paths for the Church and for an Integral Ecology," to start this October in Rome (http://www.sinodoamazonico.va/content/sinodoamazonico/en.html).

- Let us take into account the proposal, sent by the WUCWO Working Group dedicated to the healthy planet, which consists of dedicating the month of September to implement a local campaign aimed at saving water, seas and beaches from pollution. (See the poster: https://wucwo.org/index.php/en/resolutions/resolutions/general-assembly-2018/1295-earth-action-initiative.)

- Let us organise ourselves to reread and meditate together on Laudato Si, in order to discern, according to our own radius of action, concrete actions to achieve an integral human ecology that takes care at the same time of our most vulnerable brothers and sisters and of the Earth that God has created for all Humanity.

- Follow the proposal of the Latin American Jesuits (currently only in Spanish): 40 Days on the River: Sailing Together the Good News of God to the Amazonian Synod, to daily travel a path to the Synod from the place where we are, through prayer, contemplation and reflection (https://jesuitas.lat).

- Join other movements and institutions in our area or country that are already taking actions about the crisis in the Amazon basin, especially with young people who can find effective responses and thus provide a positive collaboration. I thank you in advance for communicating your initiatives to WUCWO (write to /Users/maryb/Desktop/This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.">This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.) so that we can share them with other members.

I ask the Blessed Virgin Mary that She, who knew how to react to the crisis suffered by the apostles of Jesus after his death, sheltering them united in prayer, waiting for the Holy Spirit to transform them so that the Church would be born (cf. Acts 1:14), may inspire each one of us and our organisations to know how to react in order to be capable to deal with this humanitarian crisis.

Women of WUCWO: let us not be robbed of life and the planet!

María Lía Zervino, Servidora

WUCWO President General