Catholic agencies disappointed with commitments from G-8, G-20 summits
(June 30, 2010) A $7.3 billion pledge, including $5 billion from the Group of Eight
countries, is not enough to stop millions of needless deaths among pregnant women
and young children and is not enough for the G-8 leaders to say they've lived up to
their responsibilities, representatives of Catholic aid groups said. "We're disappointed
with the G-8 leaders," said Michael Casey, executive director of the Canadian Catholic
Organization for Development and Peace, after the June 26-27 G-8 meeting in Huntsville,
Ontario. "It's kind of a failure," said Alexis Anagnan of the French Catholic aid
agency World Solidarity. As partners with Caritas Internationalis, the Catholic Church's
umbrella humanitarian and development agency, both organizations pushed the G-8 leaders
to boost their commitment to women's and children's health concerns under the Muskoka
Initiative. The development groups also urged the related Group of 20 economic summit
in Toronto June 27-28 to ramp up efforts to reduce extreme poverty worldwide by 2015
as outlined in the Millennium Development Goals established by the United Nations.
But representatives of the world's leading economies at both summits were focused
on other concerns as the worldwide recession continues. "We've entered a world where
the only language that matters is economics," Redemptorist Father Paul Hansen, director
of his order's Biblical Justice Consultancy, said after the motorcades disappeared
and the dignitaries left town.