Melissa Torres arrived in Canada as a refugee 10 years ago, rebuilding a life as an artist and educator that was far different from the family- and community-focused agricultural life she left behind in her native Honduras. There she and her family worked long hours to cultivate beans, corn and other crops on land owned by her grandparents. It was not a luxurious life, but it was full of peace and contentment, with the warmth of family, strong community connections and the joy of celebrating religious and cultural festivals.
But Goldcorp, a Canadian mining company, turned that world upside down. High levels of cyanide from gold-mining leached into a river that her village, Siria, 33 miles north of the capital Tegucigalpa, had relied on for irrigating crops, destroying livelihoods and the local economy.
“My entire community was devastated, and 35,000 people were displaced,” she said.
In Montreal, Ms. Torres leads a non-profit organization dedicated to art and language education and an art therapy program for children with physical and psychological challenges.
Her experience in Honduras inspired her to take on yet another role as a human rights activist. Ms. Torres has been active in a Canadian political campaign, Reaping our Rights. Development and Peace — Caritas Canada, locally known as “D and P,” the official international development agency of the Catholic Church in Canada, has been a driving force behind the effort.
The latest phase of the campaign concluded on Sept. 26 with the presentation of a petition on Parliament Hill in Ottawa. Signed by 52,000 Canadians, it was an appeal to the government to adopt strong laws that would compel Canadian corporations to respect human rights and the environment wherever they work.
Dean Dettloff is a research and policy advocacy officer with Development and Peace — Caritas Canada. According to Mr. Detloff, the need to enforce corporate accountability through law is more urgent now than ever “as commitments to human rights and environmental protections are increasingly at risk or even rolled back by governments around the world.”
The Canadian government has maintained a contradictory position on the issue, he said, at times insisting it wants to play a role in defending human rights and sustainable development values but without legislating real accountability from Canadian companies. But given Canada’s “long and continued historic role as a home for extractive industry,” he said, “we need laws that regulate Canadian companies abroad now more than ever as the world continues to increase its demand for so-called critical minerals used in ‘green’ energy sources and technologies.”
Canada’s mining companies operate around the world, but the industry’s most significant overseas operations can be found in Latin America and the Caribbean. A report presented to parliament two years ago by Mining Watch found that harm caused or contributed to by Canadian mining companies, their subsidiaries and contractors overseas is widespread.
“It includes environmental degradation that will persist for hundreds of years, a wide range of human rights harms, abuses of Indigenous rights, as well as negative economic and financial impacts at local and national levels,” Mining Watch reported. “Together, these impacts have serious and long-term repercussions on local and national development.”
Aidan Gilchrist-Blackwood is a coordinator for the Canadian Network for Corporate Accountability, an umbrella organization for more than 40 human rights, environmental and faith groups, including Development and Peace — Caritas Canada. “We are asking the Canadian government to enact a mandatory human rights and environmental due diligence law,” Mr. Gilchrist-Blackwood said.
“This kind of law requires companies to carefully assess the risk of harm to people and the environment when doing business, do what’s needed to minimize the risk, remedy any existing harm and do everything in their power to prevent future harm,” he explained.
“If a company fails to do any of these things, this law gives people negatively impacted by the company’s actions the power to seek justice in Canadian courts.”
“The campaign continues, not only through presenting petitions to parliament, but also through meetings and lobbying with individual parliamentarians, and conferences, and through the power of stories that illustrate the impact that unregulated industrial activity has on human lives,” he said.
“We will continue to amplify underrepresented voices. When the government presents its budget in early November, we will be monitoring [its] priorities.”
The campaign has a long way to go. After years of advocacy, the Canadian government has still not taken any meaningful action to approve the law, Carl Hetu, executive director of Development and Peace — Caritas Canada, said.
But Mr. Hetu and his colleagues are confident that justice will prevail some day. “Canadians on the whole want to believe that Canada is doing the right thing,” Mr. Dettloff said. “When we [sponsor] campaigns, we connect global souls. We take the Catholic Church and its teachings out into the world. This is faith in action, and secular parties recognize the value of it.”
Another source of hope, he said, has been the campaign’s impact on Canada’s young people. D and P’s outreach programs in Catholic schools have drawn committed teachers and supporters, inspiring a new generation of Catholic student-leaders.
Gabe Febbraro is a school advisor for Development and Peace — Caritas Canada and a teacher at the Mother Teresa Secondary School in London, Ont., a city 120 miles to the west of Toronto.
“I am truly blessed to be surrounded by so many incredible Catholic youth leaders,” she said.
“The members of the D and P Social Justice Club do such great work! They are so passionate about what they do. I guess you must be, if you’re a teenager and willing to stay up until the wee hours of the night working on various justice campaigns, cutting and pasting, and creating visual display boards.”
The students’ idealism and passion for social justice were palpable as they chatted one September afternoon about their involvement in Reaping our Rights.
“I signed the petition because every voice matters,” said Mariana Moreno-Florez, a 12th grade student. “Supporting farmers’ rights builds a just world. It’s our duty to protect the dignity of those who nourish communities worldwide.”
Her advocacy taught her the value of empathy and of listening to others. “Stay open to difficult conversations,” she said. “Real change begins with dialogue: When people listen, share and learn from one another, empathy grows and justice will be victorious.”
Mariana Cubillos Patino, a 10th grade student, had a message for her peers in Canada and around the world. “I would tell them to stand up for all human rights near and far. The voice of a young person has the power to spark meaningful change,” she said. She encouraged them to step beyond their comfort zones because “justice everywhere affects us all.”
Noah Varghese, another 10th grade student, said it is important to protect the human rights of all people because “no matter where they are from, they are born with dignity and equality and should be treated as such.”
Ms. Febbraro pointed out that for her students, the experience of being involved in the campaign has value far beyond achieving political results, even though the end goal is critically important for a more just and humane world.
“Being a Dand P school has brought such great excitement to our school community,” she said.
“This work has been transformative.” She believes it encourages her students “to become lifelong advocates of social justice.”
“They have become Catholic youth ambassadors and will spread the Gospel values wherever the Holy Spirit leads them in their lives,” Ms. Febbraro said.
In an address to popular movements in 2021, Pope Francis said that such campaigns “create hope where there appears to be only waste and exclusion.”
“We have taken this to heart at D and P, adopting ‘create hope’ as a slogan,” Mr. Dettloff said. “As Catholics we are called to create hope, which our partners and members do through their hard work every day.”
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