Ecumenical Patriarch calls for titanic and righteous battle to protect the environment

The Ecumenical Patriarch said that "for our Orthodox Church, the protection of the environment, as a divine and very good creation, embodies a great responsibility for every human person, regardless of material or financial benefits." The ecumenical patriarch is calling upon Orthodox Christians to "take part in the titanic and righteous battle to alleviate the environmental crisis." Calling for "a standard of economic and social policy whose priority will be the environment, and not unbridled financial gain." The Ecumenical Patriarch said that "for our Orthodox Church, the protection of the environment, as a divine and very good creation, embodies a great responsibility for every human person, regardless of material or financial benefits."

"The direct correlation of the God-given duty and mandate, to work and preserve, with every aspect of contemporary life constitutes the only way to a harmonious co-existence with each and every element of creation, and the entirety of the natural world in general," he added in his September 1 message for the Day of the Protection of the Environment. The day is also the beginning of the Orthodox liturgical year. The patriarch concluded, "Let us motivate ourselves to harmonize our personal and collective life and attitudes with the needs of nature's ecosystems, so that every kind of fauna and flora in the world and in the universe may live and thrive and be preserved."