Last year, the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary (RSHM) sisters, initiated a project called Our Common Ground. The goal of the program was to raise our own and others awareness about the relationship of people and Earth. The need for this has become evident through climate change, depletion of natural resources and the extinction of species. The effects on people living in vulnerable areas of our country, and around the world are particularly harsh.

Our staff visited the UN and heard four indigenous women speak about climate change, and were very impressed. It was part of our own program which is to raise our own and others awareness about the relationship of people and Earth. We heard stories of deforestation, mountain top removal, polluted ground water, and oil extracted from Canadian tar sands at great cost to the land, water and people of those areas. We were very impressed with the indigenous women from Nicaragua, Kenya Cenada and Nepal who spoke.

We were particularly impressed by Alina Saba from Nepal, and we researched more on the work she does. Her article in the Huffington Post titled “What Climate Change Means for Indigenous Peoples” talked about topics we thought important to share. Thus, we wanted to know more about Alina’s firsthand experience of her life in Nepal, so we decided to reach out to her for a Skype Dialogue. She was very eager to do it even though she was busy doing relief work in Nepal after the terrible earthquake. She made a great effort to connect with us. Watch the full interview here.

We ended up having a wonderful conversation about her relief work, and activism around the world. She talked about the importance of education in her community; how “education was a privilege. Not all girls were thought important. It was not important to send a girl child to school.” Another great point she had on indigenous peoples was how they were “much less represented in the state, politically, socially and also in education.”

Her main argument is, “in rural indigenous communities they are little listened to in making contributions re global warming, (they) are the ones bearing the most because of the brunt of climate change.” For us this is quite profound since we seldom take into account climate change affecting vulnerable communities “out there,” and somehow we can feel safe in our urban and sheltered spaces.

Thus we think it is important to share her voice, as she represents a very important part of humanity who the majority of the world seems not to be aware when we keep in mind caring for Earth.

Special report by Sr. Kathleen Kanet, RSHM and Maisha Todd from the Religious of the Sacred Heart of Mary (RSHM) sisters.