The National Catholic Reporter quotes Eric LeCompte on the Vatican Jubilee conference, Jubilee 2025 and the link between debt and climate change in the developing world. Read an excerpt below, or the full article here.

Ahead of 2025 Jubilee, Pope Francis rallies global finance heads to back debt relief

By Chris White

Eric LeCompte, the leader of Jubilee USA, a network of religious and development groups that advocates for international debt relief, described the pope's remarks as "powerful and forceful."

LeCompte, who attended the Vatican conference, told the National Catholic Reporter that "secular institutions are aware that 2025 is a Jubilee Year" and are interested in using it to push new policies to offer a better global financial model.

"Debt can no longer be disconnected from climate change and mitigation and adaptation," said LeCompte, who believes that the pope has always understood this to be the case, most evidenced by his landmark 2015 environment encyclical, Laudato Si'. 

"The north really owes a debt to the south because we took all of their resources, fueled industrialization, created the climate change that the south no longer has the resources to deal with," he said. "We took from them and now we owe them a debt to be able to deal with climate mitigation and adaptation."

Read more here.