BEING a Catholic and social activist focused on human rights and green issues, I welcome the Vatican’s recent call for the faithful to disinvest in the armament and fossil fuel industries, and to closely monitor companies in sectors like mining to check whether they are damaging the environment.

This is contained in a 225-page manual for church leaders and workers marking the fifth anniversary of Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical Laudato Si (Praised Be) on the need to protect nature, life and defenceless people.

The manual’s section on finance said people “could favour positive changes… by excluding from their investments companies that do not satisfy certain parameters”. It listed these as respect for human rights, a ban on child labour and the protection of the environment.

Called “Journeying Towards Care for Our Common Home”, one action point urged Catholics to shun companies harmful to human or social ecology, such as those to do with abortion and armaments, as well as to the environment.

What is significant about this document is that it addresses the core principle of human rights, namely the right to life, comprehensively, from a perspective that includes care for the environment without falling into cultural and ideological wars between the political right and left.

There is a tendency among Western ideologues to pick and choose life issues on the basis of an ideological disposition that forsakes the common good. For example, certain liberal groups are against the arms trade on the basis that it kills innocents, but at the same time, they support indiscriminate abortion in the name of women’s rights. Such contradiction is quite prevalent in the US and much of Europe.

Therefore, it is vital for the world’s political leaders to take a holistic view of human dignity that integrates nature, life and the protection of defenceless people. In the Malaysian context, there is a need for politicians to go beyond ethno-religious politics and focus more on human life and dignity that is in harmony with the environment.

Malaysia will not progress if it continues to be obsessed with the notion of identity that is ethnically exclusive and religious. – June 19, 2020.

* Ronald Benjamin is secretary of the Association for Community and Dialogue.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.