Pope Francis to lay bare ‘terrible world war’ on nature in papal letter

Follow-up to 2015 encyclical on climate crisis urges people to take side of ‘victims of environmental injustice’

Pope Francis has said he will issue a follow-up document on the protection of nature because a “terrible world war” against the environment was taking place.

The pontiff said the papal statement – a follow-up to his 2015 encyclical on the climate crisis – would be issued on 4 October, the feast day of Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of the environment.

Describing nature as a “sacred gift from the creator”, Francis urged people to take the side of the “victims of environmental and climatic injustice” and called for an end to “the senseless war on our common home, it is a terrible world war”.

John Kerry, the US climate envoy and former secretary of state, told Reuters in an interview in June after meeting the pope that the 2015 encyclical had a profound impact on the climate conference that year which set goals to limit global heating.

In the eight years since Laudato Si was published, there has been an increase in extreme weather events such as more intense and prolonged heatwaves, more frequent wildfires and more severe hurricanes.

Francis said last month such events showed urgent action was needed to tackle the climate crisis and appealed to world leaders “to do something more concrete to limit polluting emissions”.

He said the new document would be an apostolic exhortation, another form of papal writing.

After Laudato Si was issued, some Catholics allied with conservative political movements and corporate interests, particularly in the United States, fiercely criticised the pope for backing the opinion of a majority of scientists who say global heating is at least partly due to human activity.

Photograph: Miguel Riopa/AFP/Getty - Pope Francis attends a World Youth Day gathering of young Catholics in Lisbon on 3 August where he urged people to focus on caring for the planet.