At the Vatican for a workshop organised by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, Ban Ki-moon thanked Francis for agreeing to speak at the UN on 25 September.

Vatican City (AsiaNews) – Pope Francis met this morning with the Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Ban Ki-moon.

In this regard, the director of the Holy See Press Office, Father Federico Lombardi, said the two leaders met in private at the Casina Pio IV, home of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, where the UN Secretary General is attending the opening address of the International Workshop ‘Protect the Earth, Dignify Humanity. The Moral Dimensions of Climate Change and Sustainable Development’.

"During the meeting, the United Nations secretary general thanked the pope for agreeing to address the General Assembly of the United Nations on 25 September,” Father Lombardi said in the press conference that followed the meeting. Mr Ban “said he was looking forward to his speech on that occasion and to his next encyclical.”

The secretary general “also explained some of the points of the United Nations’ current work on environmental issues, as well as on migrants and the tragic humanitarian situations in areas of the world affected by conflict."

The Pontifical Academy of Sciences – together with the Pontifical Academy of Social Sciences, the United Nations Sustainable Development Solutions Network, and Religions for Peace – organised the aforementioned workshop.

In its statement announcing the event, the Pontifical Academy of Sciences noted that “the goal of this summit is to help strengthen the global consensus on the importance of climate change in the context of sustainable development. Global climate change adversely affects every aspect of our civilisation and thus should be a matter of serious concern across all world religions. Their effect on the poor is even more severe. We wish to elevate the importance of the moral dimensions of protecting the environment in advance of the Papal encyclical and to build a global movement to deal with climate change and sustainable development throughout 2015 and beyond.”

Hence, “The desired outcome is a joint statement on the moral and religious sustainable development, which emphasizes the intrinsic connection between the environment and respect for people, especially the poor, the excluded, the victims of trafficking in human beings and of modern slavery, children and future generations."

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