In one year since we created our Saint Kateri Habitat Program, we have designated more than 80 habitats in six countries, from Hawaii and the east and west coasts of the USA, to Canada, Honduras, Poland, India, and Cameroon, Africa. Simply by living our Catholic faith, we are restoring God’s creation for people, plants, and wildlife.
2020 marks 20 years since we started as one of the world’s first and only Catholic conservation organizations led by professional Catholic ecologists and educators.
We hope you are one of our 27,000 friends on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook, where we share daily messages of faith, hope, and love. Our approach is to strengthen our relationships with God, each other, and the whole of creation.
Our online Catholic ecology library, the largest of its kind, serves hundreds of lay and religious Catholics, teachers, students, organizations, parishes, schools, and universities around the world, with quotes from a variety of faithful Catholic sources.
As Catholics who have both science and faith, we understand that our needs are great. Our world is facing a loss of life, beginning with innocent human life, and extending to a loss of the diversity of all life. Our climate is rapidly changing, due in part to pollution and the loss of the world’s forests and other ecosystems. We are facing an “insect apocalypse” as we lose pollinator species, such as bees and butterflies, and other beneficial insects, while people damage the native plants and ecological communities on which they, and we, depend.
The Catholic Church, as one of the largest private landowners on Earth, faces difficult challenges in maintaining millions of acres of land. This land holds tremendous religious value and benefits for both people and wildlife. The Saint Kateri Conservation Center has a land trust program designed to facilitate the preservation of Catholic-owned conservation land, while maintaining the land’s religious values.
God may not have given us detailed instructions on how to solve every environmental problem, but he has given us the path to follow.
We ask that you to continue to walk with us, as we follow in the footsteps of Saint Kateri Tekakwitha and Saint Francis of Assisi. Together we will share the good news of creation and redemption, love for all people, and respect for all of God’s creatures.
This is the time of our spring appeal. We do not receive major funding from any Catholic agency. And, because we are faith- and science-based, and not politically partisan, we do not receive the kind of secular funding that political activist groups attract. Instead, we are Catholic ecologists, educators, and other volunteers restoring our faith and the planet, funded primarily by small, individual donations.
We realize that during these difficult times of high unemployment, you may not be able to donate. We understand and pray for an end to this pandemic and the social divisions of our world today.
If you are one of the more fortunate ones, please consider a donation of any amount, from $1 to $100 or more. Your donation will help us cover the costs of maintaining our website, library, habitat mapper, land trust program, and Saint Kateri Habitat Program.
While not required, if you have a registered Saint Kateri Habitat already, please consider a $20 donation to keep the program going for others.
Thank you and may God bless you. We ask Saint Kateri to pray for us.
Yours in Christ and Saint Kateri,
Bill Jacobs
Kathleen Hoenke
Ronnie O’Brien