Archbishop Barreto: Amazon – It Is A Priority For The Church

Speaking to pilgrims and visitors gathered in St Peter’s Square on Pentecost Sunday 20th May for the recitation of the Regina Caeli prayer, the Pope announced he would create 14 new Cardinals at a Consistory on the 29th June, Solemnity of the Holy Apostles, Peter and Paul. Among them will be Archbishop Ricardo Barreto from Peru.

“The countries of origin” said Pope Francis, “express the universality of the Church, which continues to announce the merciful love of God to all men on Earth. Furthermore, the new Cardinals from the Diocese of Rome also show the inseparable link between the See of Peter and the particular Churches spread throughout the world”.

Among them Pedro Ricardo Barreto Jimeno, of Huancayo, in Peru. “The appointment of Msg. Barreto as Cardinal has a very profound meaning, of great hope and profound responsibility, all of us who are close to him, commit ourselves to supporting becoming an outgoing Church and with courage, and even more so in REPAM, to promote integral ecology”, said Mauricio Lopez (Ecuador), a Catholic layman, Executive Secretary of the “Pan Amazonian Network” (REPAM).

“Mgr. Barreto is a prophet of integral ecology, he was before Laudato Sì and even more after Laudato Sì, that is why we must recognise his commitment. A short time ago, when we were in Rome for the meeting of the pre-Synodal Council of the Amazon, we remembered when he came to Ecuador for the first meeting in Puyo, thinking about the Amazonian Network. Mgr. Pedro said that the initiative of Repam was fruit of the Spirit”. Lopez pointed out.

“This spirit”,
he continued, “we have lived in the context of REPAM: a spirit of brotherhood, learning to see the ability of others in defending life, welcoming the cries of peoples, and living a spirit of missionary Church”.

Repam Secretary concluded “On other occasions, Archbishop Barreto spoke about the Amazon forest as a source of life for the world, for some this seemed exaggerated, but he went further, because he said that this was part of the Church’s concern. To have the Amazon as a priority, to give it priority, to consider it the heart of the world: only men with a heart of integral ecology can understand it”.

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