Two current CAFOD appeals reveal the devastation caused by Climate Change in far-off countries – but many of our neighbours and parishioners here in the Diocese of Leeds are feeling the effects right here at home!

News reports about the floods in Pakistan show a harrowing situation. One third of the country is under water, with 33 million people affected – displaced and facing loss of homes. Among the dead, bereaved and homeless will be loved ones, families and friends of our Pakistani and Kashmiri brothers and sisters who are our neighbours here in the Diocese of Leeds.

The love of the Body of Christ knows no boundaries and the Church community is reaching out to help. In the immediate short term, as a member charity of the UK’s Disasters Emergency Committee (DEC), CAFOD has already released £100,000 for a partner organisation in Sindh Province to support efforts to provide food (cash assistance) and emergency medical assistance – but we know that such a scale of flooding will also have a significant medium and long-term effect. Crops have been damaged: it is estimated that 45% of the cotton crop has been washed away, and the impact on production of food has yet to be truly calculated.

Despite the difficult times for all of us now facing the challenges of higher food and fuel costs, many will be thinking about the situation in Pakistan, offering prayers and looking for practical ways to respond.

Please consider supporting the appeal which CAFOD has launched today on their website: Pakistan Floods Appeal | CAFOD 

In the Horn of Africa, CAFOD is also supporting people facing the opposite effects of the climate-crisis: severe droughts as a result of the failure of the last four rains.

After many years of drought, a large-scale famine is looking likely. Hunger is rife across Kenya, Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia, reaching as far as South Sudan. These countries are the homelands of many of our own parishioners across the Diocese of Leeds – including our Eritrean congregation and clergy, one of whom is our newest priest whose family lives in South Sudan.

Local CAFOD partners are providing much needed emergency assistance through the World Food Crisis Appeal | CAFOD and this will be the focus of the forthcoming Harvest Fast Day on Friday 7 October 2022.

Please pray for all those in our diocese worrying about how their families and friends may be affected by the flooding in Pakistan and by the drought in the Horn of Africa – and please help CAFOD’s on-going work supporting people and communities around the world to live with dignity!