In 2014, CPN began work focused on natural resource extraction and land use, issues of great importance to all of the global locations where CPN has been involved. Conflict and violence have been frequent as parties have struggled for control of the wealth offered by these resources, laborers have faced exploitation and danger, and environmental harm has occurred leading to greater social instability. CPN has attempted to map Catholic engagement on these issues. And in Fall 2015, CPN sponsored a colloquium to invite scholars and experts to craft a strategy for generating theological and ethical study of these issues through the lens of peacebuilding and Catholic Social Teaching. Based on the work of that colloquium, CPN is in the process of executing a long-term research plan to integrate existing research on extractives, relate it to the practices of the Catholic community, and consider it from a peacebuilding perspective. The initiative includes:
As a complement to Catholic Approaches to Mining, CPN and the Laudato Si' Research Institute are creating a collection of case studies showing positive impacts of Church engagement on mining. It is expected to be available in the fall of 2026.
"Catholic Peacebuilding and Mining," Peace Policy: Solutions to Violent Conflict, Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, University of Notre Dame (February 2022)
Catholic Approaches to Mining: A Framework for Reflection, Planning and Action Launch Event October 21, 2025 Virtual Webinar
Over the past year, CPN has worked with the Laudato Si' Research Institute (LSRI), Campion Hall, University of Oxford on a series of consultations on the Catholic Church and mining, including a conference in Bogotá, Colombia in June 2025. That process will result in the upcoming publication of the report Catholic Approaches to Mining: A Framework for Reflection, Planning, and Action, available in English, Spanish, French, and Portuguese. The report is a collaboration between CPN, LSRI, Notre Dame's Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, part of the Keough School of Global Affairs, the Holy See Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development, and Caritas Internationalis.
A launch event for the report was held on October 21. It included Cardinal Michael Czerny, SJ, Dicastery for Promoting Integral Human Development; Jing Rey Henderson, Caritas Philippines; Rev. Rigobert Minani, SJ, Centre d'Etudes pour l'Action Sociale (DRC); Séverine Deneulin, Laudato Si' Research Institute, Campion Hall, University of Oxford; and Caesar A. Montevecchio (moderator), Catholic Peacebuilding Network, Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, Keough School of Global Affairs, University of Notre Dame.
Peacebuilding, Mining, and Integral Human Development June 10-13, 2025 Bogotá, Colombia
In a number of the world’s most intractable conflicts, the Catholic Church has played and is playing a major role in peacebuilding. In many areas, this peacebuilding work is becoming increasingly intertwined with issues around resource extraction, illicit economies, and the search for modes of integral human development that do not induce environmental violence, human rights violations, breakdowns in social cohesion, backsliding in peace processes, or disempowerment of already marginalized peoples. These new circumstances are presenting new and complex challenges for achieving sustainable peace.
Much of this peacebuilding work by the Catholic community is unheralded, under-resourced, and under-analyzed. While the Church’s peacebuilding work in some conflict situations has been well documented, Catholic peacebuilders from different countries rarely have the opportunity to compare notes on lessons learned and best practices with their counterparts in other countries and scholars. Moreover, in many cases, the Church’s peacebuilding work could be enhanced if it were based on more strategic and less ad hoc and reactive approaches. The sponsors of this project have been deeply engaged in a variety of ways with the Church’s peacebuilding efforts for many years, and the purpose of this conference was to foster this kind of networking and mutual learning with regard to the unique challenges of peacebuilding, mining, and integral human development.
David Cortright, Professor Emeritus of the Practice at the Kroc Institute and Editor of the Kroc Institute’s Peace Policy publication sits down to talk with authors from the latest issue. This issue features reflections drawn from the new book, Catholic Peacebuilding and Mining: Integral Peace, Development, and Ecology published by Routledge in January, 2022.
Guests include one of the co-editors of the book and the Assistant Director of the Catholic Peacebuilding Network, Caesar Montevecchio; Father Rigobert Minani, S.J., head of research for the Peace, Human Rights, Democracy, and Good Governance Department at the Centre d’Etude Pour l’Action Sociale in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and team leader for the Ecclesial Network of the Congo Basin Forest; and Katherine Marshall, Senior Fellow at Georgetown University’s Berkley Center for Religion, Peace and World Affairs, and Executive Director of the World Faiths Development Dialogue.
Episode Five continues the discussion with the Catholic Peacebuilding Network on the extractive industries. Ray Offenheiser speaks with Peter Bryant – Chair and Co-Founder of the Development Partner Institute – and discusses how the Extractive Industries are rethinking their role in society.
Ian Gary – Director of Power and Money at Oxfam America – talks with Ray Offenheiser and discusses the ethics and activism in the extractive industries. This episode is a recording of Offenheiser’s conversation with Gary as part of a two-part, live webinar hosted in partnership with the Catholic Peacebuilding Network.
Also visit the following sites for Church organizations specifically dedicated to working on issues of extractives in CPN partner areas.
Iglesias y Minería: Churches and Mining is an ecumenical group made up of lay groups, religious congregations, and bishops and pastors addressing issues around mining and justice.
REPAM: Red Ecclesia Amazonica, a cooperative commission of bishops' conferences in the Amazon basin that works on issues of environment and natural resources.
Ecclesial Network of the Congo Basin Forest: A cooperative of regional and national justice and peace commissions of the Symposium of the Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar.
Alyansa Tigil Mina: Composed of Non-Government Organizations, People’s Organizations, Church groups and academic institutions, Alyansa Tigil Mina is both an advocacy group and a people’s movement, working in solidarity to protect Filipino communities and natural resources that are threatened by large-scale mining operations.
Justice in Mining: A global network of Jesuit social centers and organizations working on socio-environmental justice in areas impacted by extractive-related conflict.
