Abstract
Conflicts over natural resources reveal the inseparability of issues such as ecological degradation, structural injustice, human dignity, and peace. This article examines the Catholic Church’s pastoral role in such conflicts through the case study of Juan Antonio López, a Honduran lay Catholic leader, environmental defender, and Delegate of the Word who was killed in September 2024 after years of advocacy against extractive projects threatening local communities and water sources. Drawing on political ecology, development theory, biblical reflection, and Catholic Social Teaching, the article argues that conflicts over natural resources cannot be adequately addressed through legal, economic, or institutional frameworks alone. They also require moral, cultural, and pastoral responses capable of sustaining communities in their pursuit of justice and peace. First, the biblical narratives of disputes over wells in Genesis illuminate both the necessity and fragility of legal agreements when fear, domination, and unequal power shape access to life-sustaining resources. Then, in dialogue with the Church’s social magisterium, especially the tradition of integral human development, the article claims that the Church’s distinctive contribution lies in pastoral accompaniment: walking with vulnerable communities, defending the common good, encouraging the development of just societies by raising just individuals, denouncing structures of injustice, and finally witnessing to a just peace rooted in human dignity, fraternity, and care for creation.
Keywords:
Catholic Social Teaching; integral human development; environmental conflict; Juan Antonio López
1. Introduction
The question of peace has always been linked to humanity’s relationship with natural resources. Natural resources often lead to conflicts, to which the Church seeks to respond in order to defend and protect human dignity and human flourishing. Environmental conflicts, therefore, raise particular questions about the Church’s role in pastoral accompaniment of people and communities desiring to live out the Gospel’s call to be peacebuilders in lands and contexts marked by conflicts over natural resources. For this reason, this article seeks to articulate normative pastoral reflections for the Church in these contexts where peace and the environment are so related to human development, drawing especially from the case study of Juan Antonio López and from the social magisterium of the Church, and also from political and ecological economy, development theory and biblical insight.
Juan Antonio Lopéz was a lay Catholic leader and environmental defender who was killed in September 2024 for the Gospel and the common good of impoverished people whose lands are exploited for their natural resources. A first reason to focus on his case is that, across Latin America, conflicts over extractive industries have intensified in recent decades, especially in regions where extractivism—understood as large-scale removal of natural resources such as mining, logging and drilling—intersects with fragile ecosystems and vulnerable communities. Honduras stands as a paradigmatic case of this dynamic. The expansion of extractive activities has generated not only environmental degradation but also deep social tensions. These tensions often escalate into violence against defenders of the environment and of the communities that depend on it. The assassination of Juan Antonio López, therefore, is emblematic of a broader pattern in which ecological conflict becomes inseparable from struggles over human rights, development, justice and peace.
A brief contextualization of the situation in Latin America helps to further appreciate the relevance of Juan Antonio’s case. A study by Bebbington et al. (2019) has recently shed light on the particular history of mining in the region, showing that El Salvador’s antimining movement secured a national ban on mining in 2017, thanks to the Church’s social and theological arguments, and the weak opposition from economic elites, unconvinced of the potential for mining in the country, while in Honduras, where the antimining movement was historically stronger than in El Salvador, the link between mining and hydroelectric projects made the former central to the accumulation strategies of elites in the country, neutralizing the presence of strong institutions against it, like the Church. The study is important for our purposes because it concludes that, to craft viable strategies in these contexts, it is vital to look at “the political economy of the environment, the nature of national political settlements, and the detailed forms of network and embeddedness that cut across (or fail to cut across) the boundaries between civil society, government, legislature, and religious institutions” (101). We shall take this advice into consideration, although we aim at going beyond it, as we shall argue.
In fact, ecological conflicts cannot be adequately addressed merely through the lens of political or ecological economics. The question of the Church’s pastoral responsibilities in these contexts demands a normative framework able to define the goals and criteria of her actions. For this reason, we shall look at two different versions of development theory. Traditional development paradigms often interpret extractivism as a necessary means to growth, appealing to increases in gross domestic product, foreign investment and export revenues. Nevertheless, Nobel laureate Amartya Sen argues that true development cannot be measured merely by economic growth or resource extraction, but by the expansion of human freedoms, rights, and capabilities (Sen 1999). Traditional models tend to be blind to the social and ecological costs borne disproportionately by marginalized populations; they also limit the discussion about the most efficient means of attaining economic growth. We need a more comprehensive theory of development that can explain human development beyond profit motives. Sen argues, therefore, that “[v]iewing development in terms of expanding substantive freedoms directs attention to the ends that make development important, rather than merely to some of the means that, inter alia, play a prominent part in the process” (3). This allows him to identify a dignified, healthy, and participatory life as a necessary end for a true development of human freedom. Finding support in his theory, we shall integrate it with Catholic Social Teaching to argue that ecological degradation, especially when leading to conflicts and violence that undermine justice, peace and human flourishing, is not an inevitable side effect of development, but a sign of its failure.
Crucially, if the Church wants to address pastoral concerns about peacebuilding and human development in conflicts linked to extractive industries, we should note that they can only be addressed at the level of values. Indeed, they are not merely disputes over the use of natural resources but are better understood as ecological distribution conflicts—that is, struggles over the unequal distribution of environmental benefits and burdens. This concept highlights how such conflicts are rooted in structural inequalities and competing systems of valuation (Martínez-Alier 2002). Environmental conflicts often emerge when local communities defend land, water, and ecosystems that are essential for their livelihoods against external actors seeking to exploit them for profit. Importantly, such struggles are not only material but also involve competing systems of value, in which economic growth is weighed against cultural identity, environmental sustainability and human dignity. In fact, Raftopoulos (2017, p. 389) shows how the expansion of extractive economic models across Latin America systematically generated human rights abuses and “opened up new political spaces for human-rights-based resistance”. This empirical study shows that the Church’s ability to promote true development and build peace must consider not only the theoretical challenges of a narrow theory of development, and the institutional and structural contexts in which socio-environmental conflicts arise, but chiefly the cultural and ethical values that orient local people and communities to defend against the exploitation of natural resources and violations of human dignity. This is the core motivation for the pastoral scope and standpoint of this paper.
Within this complex landscape, the Catholic Church has emerged as credible and effective, as a teacher of a deeper tradition of human development, and, most importantly, as a significant moral and social voice, capable of accompanying people and communities in the pursuit of just peace and true development. In Latin America, sectors of the Church have increasingly engaged with environmental issues, drawing on Catholic Social Teaching to articulate critiques of narrowly extractivist development models and to propose alternative visions of human development. Specifically, their engagement is grounded in the concept of integral human development, which emphasizes the interconnectedness of social, economic and environmental dimensions of human flourishing. The aim, then, is to clarify an articulation of the Church’s practical and pastoral support in these cases.
So, this paper examines the role of the Catholic Church in Honduras in the context of environmental conflict, focusing on its response to extractive industries and its defense of human dignity. Through the case of Juan Antonio López, it explores how religious actors contribute to the quest for justice and peace, mobilizing communities, unmasking corruption, and challenging the dominant development paradigms. It argues that the Church’s contribution cannot be understood only at the level of moral teaching or institutional advocacy, but must be grasped in its specifically pastoral dimension: the practice of Christian accompaniment that engages concrete communities and people within structural realities of socio-environmental conflict.
Methodologically, the article adopts an interdisciplinary approach that draws from political ecology, development theory, and theological analysis. It integrates normative theological reflection with a qualitative case study, drawing on public reports and selected scholarly literature to interpret the case of Juan Antonio López within broader structural and ethical frameworks. In line with recent works in practical theology, which emphasize the need for pastoral responses to ecological crises (McCarroll 2020), this approach understands pastoral theology as a doctrinal reflection on a contextually engaged, lived practice that is always centered on human life and human dignity, even when considering socio-environmental conflicts over natural resources. This approach allows the paper to move between empirical analysis and theological reflection, situating pastoral practice within the concrete dynamics of environmental conflict while also articulating its normative significance for the construction of a just peace.
The quest for peace is, in fact, at the very heart of Pope Leo XIV’s pontificate. “Peace be with you all!” are Christ’s words with which our new pope Leo presented himself to the Church and the world (Leo XIV, First Blessing “Urbi et Orbi”). He is in fact “a son of St. Augustine” who taught, in City of God, that peace is the ultimate, final good of all things, and “there is no one who does not wish to have peace” (Augustine, City of God, XIX, 11, 932). This theological perspective provides the horizon within which the preceding analysis must be understood. There is a natural, universal desire for peace in all human beings. Even those who foster conflict and wage war desire peace, but they want it their own way. True peace is not built on domination or coercion but on justice. Even more, peace depends upon a culture wherein individuals endure injustices out of what Leo XIII called a “love for justice”, based on the recognition of our common humanity and our love of neighbor. As John XXIII said in his encyclical Pacem in Terris: “Peace is but an empty word, if it does not rest upon that order … that is founded on truth, built up on justice, nurtured and animated by charity, and brought into effect under the auspices of freedom” (John XXIII, Pacem in Terris, 167).
The Church continues to have much to contribute to the intellectual reflection on just peace, but her primary role is pastoral: to walk with everyone in their quest for peace, especially those who suffer and so cry out for justice, promoting that love which moves them to be peacebuilders. The Church wishes to walk with all to foster a true sentiment of belonging to our common human family, where the good of each is connected to the good of all. On this view of humanity, let us construct what Paul VI called “a civilization of love”, expanded by Pope Francis with his magisterium of Fratelli tutti, siblings all.
The following sections develop this argument in three steps. First, a biblical perspective situates conflicts over natural resources within a broader theological understanding of justice, peace, and the use of creation, highlighting the limits of purely institutional and legal resolutions when not accompanied by cultural and moral transformation. Second, the case of Juan Antonio López offers a concrete example of how these tensions unfold in a context marked by extractive conflict, environmental defense, and violence. Third, the role of the Church is examined from a pastoral and practical perspective, drawing on the social magisterium, supported by recent studies in social sciences, to identify pathways by which ecclesial accompaniment can contribute to the construction of a just peace.
2. Biblical Awareness of the Problem
The Bible highlights the critical role of natural resources, chiefly water, in ensuring peaceful coexistence among different peoples. Recent theological scholarship highlights how biblical narratives already reflect proto-forms of socio-environmental conflict linked to access to water and land (Audu and Ojewole 2013). For example, in the first chapters of Genesis, we encounter instances of conflicts and resolutions regarding the possibility of accessing wells, hence water, the basic natural resource for life and civilization. In Genesis 21, Abraham resolves a dispute over a well through a covenant with Abimelech, emphasizing the need for just, institutional agreements to manage resource conflicts. Yet, a generation later in Genesis 26, Isaac’s experience, where similar disputes arise despite past agreements, illustrates the fragility of such covenants when fear and power dynamics intervene. If we had to translate these biblical stories into our context, we could say that while Abraham’s story shows the necessity of a legal-normative approach to conflict resolution, the story of Isaac displays the fragility of this same approach. There is a fragility in the covenant of Genesis 21, which is jeopardized by Abimelech’s fear, a generation later in Genesis 26.
In other words, the biblical stories show that while justice and legal frameworks are essential for peace in conflicts over natural resources, they are also fragile. Thus, the Bible provides a realistic lens through which the Church can also address modern conflicts over natural resources. Moreover, the biblical stories’ acknowledgement of the complexity of real-life situations does not lend itself to constructing systems and theories as much as it seeks to transform lives. Justice and peace are not merely theoretical ideals, but concrete realities that the Gospel calls us to build together, nourished by God’s gift of grace and His work of redemption in Christ. Justice is not established by impersonal laws and regulations alone, but by the lives of dedicated men and women with the courage to stand up against injustices and for the common good and who are willing to endure hardship, regardless of the consequences. As we shall see, this calls not only for a theory of development able to account for the relationship between land and human flourishing, but chiefly for a pastoral strategy to accompany people of goodwill in these contexts.
3. The Story of Juan Antonio López
A just society grows from the lives of just individuals. When societies and institutions are corrupted by widespread structural injustices that can be analyzed through the lenses of political and ecological economy, the quest for justice that is necessary for peace must go beyond these theoretical and empirical resources in social sciences. It must find moral resources that can illuminate the consciences and strengthen the moral resolve of individuals who choose to resist evil with good, even at great cost, to build a more just and peaceful community overcoming structural injustices. The story of Juan Antonio López is a real-life case study that shows what is at stake in conflicts over natural resources. It provides the context for some more concrete pastoral reflections. López was a lay Catholic leader and environmental defender who, giving his life for the Gospel and for the common good of poor people whose lands are exploited for their natural resources, became a modern-day martyr. His life and death have been widely recognized by international human rights bodies and civil society organizations as emblematic of the risks faced by those defending the common good in extractive contexts (White 2024; Amnesty International 2024).
In northeastern Honduras, in Tocoa, the largest town in the district of Colon, Juan Antonio López was a family man and a Delegate of the Word, the lay leader of small Christian communities which make up his parish, San Isidro Labrador. He presided regularly over the liturgy of the Word. Juan Antonio was very devoted to St. Oscar Romero and followed his example, embodying a form of pastoral leadership in which faith cannot be separated from the defense of human dignity, denouncing injustice, and ultimately giving his life. In this sense, Juan Antonio’s actions were not merely social or political, but pastoral: an expression of the Church’s mission to accompany suffering communities and to bear witness to justice, even at great personal cost. Indeed, Juan Antonio’s faith was never confined within church walls; rather, it animated his commitment to social justice and ecological responsibility. He was the social action coordinator of his Diocese and an active member of REMAM, the Mesoamerican Ecological Ecclesial Network, which unites Churches of Mexico and Central America in their defence of creation. In his ministry and mission, it was clear that Juan Antonio understood that “to hear both the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor…, a true ecological approach always becomes a social approach; it must integrate questions of justice in debates on the environment” (LS 49).
His activism was not isolated but embedded within organized community resistance. He was a leading member of the Municipal Committee for the Defence of the Common and Public Good of Tocoa, a coalition opposing extractive projects in the Banjo Aguàn region (White 2024). In 2019, as alderman or councilor of the Municipality of Tocoa, he founded the Municipal Committee for the Defence of the Common and Public Good. He was also a pivotal figure of the Pastoral Ministry for Integral Ecology across Honduras, serving with Bishop Jenry Ruiz from the Diocese of Trujillo. Together, they organized workshops on ecological and social issues, raising awareness on exploitations that were intentionally kept hidden from public knowledge; they led protests and formed alliances among ecclesial and civic movements, which made their initiatives very effective.
In particular, Juan Antonio López became a leading voice in opposing the illegal and destructive operations of the Pinares mining company (formerly, Emco Mining Company), owned by one of Honduras’ most powerful families, the Facussé. The company had a business interest in the land of the national park called “Montaña Botaderos Clarlos Escaleras”, a protected area that is essential to the lives of the local population. Local and civil society accounts describe a pattern of irregular land transfers, legal manipulation, and institutional complicity that enable extractive expansion in the area. For instance, in 2013, the government reduced the core of the protected area of 24,223 hectares by allotting 217 hectares for programs of agrarian reform meant to support small farmers, alleviate rural poverty and strengthen food security. But this intention was sabotaged; the lands were funneled into the land exploitation project of the Pinares mining company.
Between 2017 and 2022, with the complicity of state officials, Pinares acquired twelve parcels of land that had been designated for agrarian reform. In one instance, a security guard named Allan Edgardo Escobar Navarro received five parcels for agrarian reform, only to sell them to Pinares just six months later at a significant profit. These transactions, facilitated by individuals closely tied to the mining company, was part of a larger pattern of corruption, deceit and manipulation of laws. Some landowners were pressured or deceived into selling their parcels, probably unaware of the full legal and ecological consequences. Through falsified municipal documents, manipulated environmental studies, and hidden land transfers, Pinares effectively transferred vast portions of public and ecologically vital land to their own private interests.
The salience of the problem is heightened by the fact that the national park is directly connected to the Guapinol and San Pedro rivers, vital sources of drinking water for the surrounding population. This brings us back to the biblical stories in Genesis and the importance of accessing water for the flourishing of life and the development or maintenance of peace. As early as 2018, when the mining company began to build an access road, the water became unusable for about fifty thousand local residents. This was not a future environmental risk—it was an immediate consequence. When local communities organized to defend their right to clean water, they were met with repression: peaceful protesters were criminalized, environmental defenders were imprisoned, and intimidation campaigns intensified, stirring fear through public defamation and death threats. Human rights organizations have consistently documented this pattern of criminalization and violence against environmental defenders in the region (Amnesty International 2024).
The company claimed that the mining operations would generate jobs and wealth for the region. Yet, such claims are typical of extractivist development narratives that prioritize macroeconomic gains while neglecting local socio-environmental costs. For this reason, Escobar (2011, pp. 97–98) argues that “it becomes necessary to recognize that forms of production are not independent from the representations … of social life in which they exist”. In other words, the claims of macroeconomic gains often do not take into account the concrete local realities of human beings and environments. Indeed, it is inconceivable that the well-being of the population was ever a genuine concern of that company when the very foundation of life—namely, access to safe water—was sacrificed by them in the name of profit.
According to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, López had been the beneficiary of precautionary measures since 2023 due to death threats, harassment, and surveillance linked to his environmental work (Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) 2025, p. 1). These measures were granted in response to a documented pattern of violence against members of the Committee, including intimidation, monitoring and acts of aggression associated with extractive conflicts in the Bajo Aguán region. According to civil society reports, on Wednesday, 11 September 2024, three days before his murder, Juan Antonio confided to a local priest that municipal officials had offered him about $310,000 (8 million lempiras) to abandon the movement. He refused to step back. Three days later, on Saturday 14 September, the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, Juan Antonio led the liturgy of the Word at 7pm in the small chapel of his neighborhood. After the liturgy, already in his car with his wife, two daughters and two fellow pastoral workers, gunmen opened fire and murdered him. His killing has been widely interpreted within a pattern of violence against environmental defenders in contexts of extractive conflict (America Magazine 2024; Amnesty International 2024). The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) (2025) explicitly condemned the murder and urged the Honduran state to investigate it, considering his role as an environmental defender as a possible motive.
Juan Antonio’s martyrdom demonstrates, in a documented and concrete way, that true, lasting peace cannot be built apart from justice, and justice cannot exist where natural resources are plundered for private gain at the expense of the common good. Cases such as this align with global patterns in which environmental defenders are targeted in contexts of extractive conflict (Menton and Le Billon 2021). But it also confirms that the issue of natural resources cannot be resolved within a merely normative-legal framework, especially because, in conflicts over natural resources, there is often the corrupt complicity of government and political authorities. In fact, as we have already mentioned, Juan Antonio was technically under a protection order issued in 2023 by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACHR); yet these measures were clearly ineffective in Honduras.
The gap between formal legal protection and actual security reveals a structural failure that cannot be addressed without deeper ethical, cultural, and pastoral engagement. For this reason, Lopez’s life and death must be understood not only as a political or environmental case, but also as a theological locus: a concrete instance in which faith, justice, and the defense of creation converge in the lived witness of a Christian community. The story of Juan Antonio shows how faith in Jesus Christ can inspire a correct understanding of the common good and our relationship with nature. Hence, we now turn to the specific role of the Church in environmental conflicts from a pastoral and practical perspective.
4. The Role of the Church and Practical Recommendations
What is the Church’s role in promoting peace amid conflicts over natural resources? Her crucial role is one of service and accompaniment, walking with men and women who, pursuing justice, work for peace. The martyrdom of Juan Antonio López shows how closely and deeply involved the Church can be, acting in her members, to conserve natural resources and respect the people whose survival and livelihood depend on these resources. This is true conflict resolution and the construction of just peace. Moreover, faithful Catholics can find their individual action informed and guided by the magisterium of the Church, which educates her children to be ministers of the Gospel who can contribute to peace, integral human development, a just society and, ultimately, a civilization of love. We shall now draw seven points from the social magisterium of the Church to substantiate our vision of the Church’s pastoral approach in conflicts over natural resources.
First, the magisterium instructs us about both the necessity and the limitation of relying on legislation and on political authorities in resolving social issues. In Leo XIII’s Rerum Novarum, which inaugurated modern Catholic Social Teaching, we read that “rulers should anxiously safeguard the community and all its members,” because their power is legitimized by their duty to preserve the community’s well-being, and this “is a government’s whole reason of existence” (RN 35). John XXIII re-affirms that human societies cannot attain peace “without the presence of those who, invested with legal authority, preserve its institutions and do all that is necessary to sponsor actively the interests of all its members” (PiT 46). At the same time, contemporary international frameworks clarify that this responsibility extends specifically to protecting citizens from abuses by economic actors. The United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights affirm that “under international human rights law states have the duty to protect against human rights abuse within their jurisdiction by third parties, and that third parties include business enterprises” (Ruggie 2013, p. 4). In parallel, the document also affirms that corporations themselves bear the “responsibility to respect human rights… and to remedy human rights harms that they caused or contributed to” (Ruggie 2013, p. 5). But as Leo XIII had already noted, a political-juridical response alone is insufficient, especially when political systems are corrupted. In contexts such as Honduras, where state institutions fail to enforce these obligations effectively, this dual framework exposes a critical gap between normative responsibility and lived reality. It is precisely within this gap that the Church’s pastoral role becomes indispensable.
Second, the construction of a just peace depends on placing human persons and their dignity at the center. The insufficiency of a purely political-juridical response to conflicts over natural resources leads us to find more effective resource for conflict-resolution and peacebuilding in the concept of the human person. Indeed, true peace is grounded in fraternity. Paul VI laments a human society that is “sorely ill” and explains that “the cause is not so much the depletion of natural resources, nor their monopolistic control by a privileged few; but it is rather the weakening of fraternal ties between individuals and nations” (PP 66). This emphasis parallels development frameworks linking human capabilities and social cohesion to sustainable outcomes (Sen 1999). Gaudium et Spes recognizes the universal call to human fraternity in the light of God being first principle and final end of all. Paul VI then emphasizes that Christians in particular are called to build a “civilization of love” (PP 42). Therefore, the construction of a just peace depends on protecting human dignity and promoting fraternity, tasks in which the Church’s pastoral role becomes essential through her accompaniment of persons and communities.
Third, once the human person is at the center, a concept of development must follow. It is not sufficient to merely acknowledge our common humanity and foster sentiments of fraternity to resolve the underlying problem of socio-environmental conflicts. There is a need for a theory of development, substituting the mere pursuit of economic growth, that can provide normative ends of human development. As noted above, Sen (1999) provides such a theory that seeks to integrate the idea of development with that of the human person, specifically with the enjoyment of human freedom. The Church has also always rooted her social teaching in a profound vision of the human person. In particular, John Paul II teaches that “development must not be understood solely in economic terms, but in a way that is fully human” (CA 29). This is a powerful criterion for defining the goal towards which the Church is accompanying people in these contexts. Diverting natural resources toward extractive and military industries while neglecting the poor is not development; it is injustice on which no peace can be built. “The advancement of the poor” is not a burden, but “a great opportunity for the moral, cultural and even economic growth of all humanity” (CA 28).
Fourth, the Church can help to move conflicts to a conversation about values since she affirms the value of the market but warns against giving it absolute status. In his above-mentioned seminal work in ecological economics, Martínez-Alier (2002, p. 44) states that conflicts over natural resources “might arise because of the existence of different values but also of different interests”. Specifically, the Church’s teaching argues against a narrow view where value is reduced to profit, and development to economic growth alone. For this reason, John Paul II denounces the “idolatry of the market” that treats all things—people, nature, even spiritual goods—as commodities (CA 40). Moreover, beyond any system of exchange, something is due to the human person simply “because he is man, by reason of his lofty dignity … The criticisms are directed not so much against an economic system as against an ethical and cultural system … The economy needs ethics in order to function correctly, not any ethics whatsoever but an ethics which is people-centred” (CA 39, 40, 45). This position, rooted in biblical faith and Christian anthropology, is also found in the classic sociological theories which argue that treating nature and human beings purely as commodities destroys society, presenting therefore broader critiques of commodification and market society (Polanyi 1944). To put it graphically, insofar as the ‘invisible hand’ of the market is choking people to death, it is an evil hand.1 Hence, to promote peace in socio-environmental conflicts, the Church’s pastoral strategy can clarify values and resist letting market interests for profit alone dominate.
Fifth, the socio-ecological crisis stems from an anthropological and moral crisis that the Church is well-equipped to address. John Paul II, for instance, links consum-erism with destruction of the natural environment. “At the root of [this] senseless de-struction … lies an anthropological error” that sees nature as raw material for manipula-tion rather than as a gift to be cared for (CA 37). This anthropological error is not only a moral or philosophical mistake, but is built into dynamics of modern economic sys-tems. In fact, capitalism often depends on the conceptual separation between “nature” and “society”, treating the natural world as something external that can be appropri-ated and exploited for accumulation (Moore 2015). Benedict XVI observes that “the book of nature is one and indivisible, on the side of the environment as on the side of life, sex-uality, marriage, the family, social relations, in a word, integral human development” con-cluding that with regards to the challenges related to the natural environment “the de-cisive issue is the overall moral tenor of society” (51). In this light, the ecological crisis re-veals not so much personal moral failure as a broader cultural-structural distortion of humanity’s understanding of its place within creation. Human dignity and the natural world are inseparably related. The Church has masterfully expressed this in Pope Francis’ encyclical letter Laudato Si’.
Sixth, there is need for a profound cultural and spiritual transformation to resist the ideological reduction and distortion of the market and foster a true vision of the common good, just peace, and an integral ecology in which environmental and human development are inexorably related. According to Leo XIII, conflicts start at the level of ideas; he condemned various ideologies that threatened the sanctity of human life and the dignity of every human being. Ideologies, chiefly materialism and secularism, reduce and distort reality, offering a fallacious grounding for justice and peace and often depriving people of the spiritual resources that religions offer to recognize their common humanity. This insight finds a significant parallel in contemporary Latin American thought. Gudynas (2011), for instance, argues that the dominant model of development persists as a “zombie category”, simultaneously discredited and yet continually reproduced within modern culture, thereby preventing genuine alternatives from emerging. In Laudato si’, Pope Francis reminds us that “everything is interconnected” and the care of creation is “inseparable from justice, fraternity, and faithfulness to others” (LS 70). By contrast, the prevailing “technocratic paradigm” reduces the world to data and utility, severing it from the horizon of existential meaning and from the recognition of the dignity of every human being. The crisis is not only socio-environmental or political, but spiritual and cultural, demanding a “cultural revolution” able to resist the technocratic paradigm (LS 114). As already noted, Leo XIII emphasizes that, besides mitigating conflicts, the Church is uniquely able to resist ideological reductions of reality that undermine a just peace based on the recognition of a common humanity where each exercises personal responsibility for their neighbor. Recalling the Church’s pacifying history, he concludes: “Having tamed the barbarian races by inspiring them with love of justice, [the Church] has led them from the ferocity of their warlike habits to the practice of the arts of peace and civilization” (Leo XIII, Nostis errorem). Hoping that the Church would help such a cultural revolution, Pope Francis calls for “a distinctive way of looking at things, a way of thinking, policies, an educational program, a lifestyle and a spirituality” (LS 111) that can restore our sense of responsibility.
Seventh, these many ideas converge in the Church’s vision of integral human development. The six previous points form a coherent whole: the limitations of political authority; the centrality of human dignity; the priority of the poor in development; the moral limits of markets; the moral and anthropological roots of ecological crisis; and the spiritual-cultural conversion needed to overcome it. These are not abstract principles—they are the foundation for just and lasting peace. They call for development rooted in solidarity and fraternity, truth and love, for which Juan Antonio gave his life. For this reason, in conflicts over natural resources, the Church’s pastoral strategy is to accompany people to grow in solidarity. John Paul II recalls the different ways in which solidarity was discussed in the recent magisterium: Leo XIII called the principle of solidarity “friendship,” Pius XI “social charity,” Paul VI a “civilization of love” (CA 10), and most recently, Pope Francis “fratelli tutti”, siblings all. In all its formulations, solidarity is the recognition of a single, shared human vocation as sons and daughters of God. Therefore, in light of this principle, promoting integral human development must be understood in the words of John XXIII, who hoped that people would recognize a major duty arising from our common human nature “namely that love not fear [like in Abimelech’s case] must dominate the relationships between individuals and between nations” (PiT, 146). This is the Church’s pastoral role in conflicts over natural resources: to walk with people as a living witness of that perfect love which casts out fear and strengthens hearts to overcome evil with good, even at great cost.
Above all, we must resist the temptation to turn conflicts over natural resources into abstractions at the so-called “global level”. Although the Church recognizes that systemic issues exist and their solution requires the collaboration of all, it also appreciates that each problem is embedded in a unique particular context, and the universal Church is expressed in the local Church. This means that the concrete lives of parishes and parishioners are the front line of the Church’s role in pacifying conflicts for natural resources. But that ‘front line’ does not operate alone; also engaged are the local diocese as institutional interlocutor, the bishop as shepherd of his people, national and regional conferences to coordinate initiatives as well as to shape a moral discourse that can challenge political narratives, and finally also exchange expertise, best practices and pastoral resources.
These are not only theoretical recommendations but testaments of how the Church is already concretely involved in the resolution of conflicts over natural resources around the world. In Peru, Catholic leaders have defended the rights of indigenous communities displaced by illegal gold mining, offering both pastoral and legal support. In the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Cardinal Ambongo has denounced the exploitation of rare-earth minerals that fuels ecological devastation and armed conflict. In Burkina Faso, where terrorist groups weaponize control of water sources, the local Church has responded with both advocacy and direct aid. In Guatemala and the Philippines, bishops give sanctuary to environmental defenders, thereby joining their voices to those of civil society.
In the words of Pope Francis, “You have to be there to remind [politicians] whom they are serving. You must stand there like the widow in the Gospel, insisting, insisting, causing them to lose patience so that they will do justice. This is a tactic that Jesus taught us. Surely you will find other tactics, but always within non-violence, please always work for peace. War is a crime” (Pope Francis, Address to the Meeting of Popular Movements). These examples and this teaching are signs of hope. They demonstrate that the Church can and must be a visible force for justice, the care of creation, the defense of human dignity, and the construction of peace. The work is difficult. It requires courage, persistence, and faith, to the point of giving one’s life. But the path is clear: to walk with the poor, to listen to the earth, and to act in love out of recognition of our common humanity and our universal desire for peace.
5. Conclusions
This article has examined the killing of Juan Antonio López as a paradigmatic case of the convergence in Latin America of ecological degradation, structural injustice, and violence against those defending the environment and the common good that depends on it. Looking at the context through the lens of political ecology and development critique, the analysis has first shown how extractivist dynamics, supported by asymmetrical power relations and weak institutional protections, create conditions where environmental defenders become targets of repression and elimination.
Building on this diagnosis, the article engaged theological reflection on the Church’s pastoral role in conflicts over natural resources. It first argued that the defense of creation and life is inseparable from the pursuit of a just peace. Biblical accounts have specifically suggested that while justice and legal frameworks are essential for peace, they are also fragile. Following the observation that justice is not established by impersonal laws alone, but by the lives of dedicated men and women with the courage to stand against injustices and for the common good, we turned to the case of Juan Antonio López. It chiefly shows that, rather than remaining at the level of general moral exhortation, the Church is called to accompany affected communities, to support their struggles for justice, and to denounce structures of injustice that perpetuate environmental destruction and social exclusion. Finally, this led to some key pastoral considerations on how the Church can fulfill her role of service and accompaniment of communities striving for integral human development in the face of complicated realities that lead to conflicts over natural resources.
In this light, the words of Pope Leo XIV at the beginning of his pontificate echo the realities described throughout this study: “In this our time, we still see too much discord, too many wounds caused by hatred, violence, prejudice, the fear of difference, and an economic paradigm that exploits the Earth’s resources and marginalises the poorest.” His call for the Church to be “a small leaven of unity, communion and fraternity within the world” expresses, in pastoral terms, the vocation that this article has sought to articulate (Leo XIV, Homily, Holy Mass for the Beginning of the Pontificate, Saint Peter’s Square). Ultimately, the witness of Juan Antonio López reveals both the necessity and the cost of defending life in contexts marked by violence and ecological crisis. It is precisely through such lived witness and ecclesial accompaniment that the Church credibly participates in the construction of a just peace, so that, in the midst of serious conflict, communities may truly be able to testify: the Church is with us.
