IT’S AN INCREASINGLY RELIGIOUS WORLD, AND RELIGION IS KNOWN TO BE A STRONG DRIVER OF ATTITUDES TOWARDS NATURE.

the past 40 years the country has suffered such severe deforestation that just 3 per cent of its tree cover remains. The forests are now “critical conservation areas for a large proportion of Ethiopia’s remaining biodiversity”, says Lowman, who believes that the work of the Coptic Priests keeps the remaining trees standing.

The Latin American church network REPAM works on an even larger scale. It brings together Christian institutions in nine countries that have contact with the Amazon rainforest. Its aim is to protect the forest and its traditional peoples by helping those involved in conflict resolution and wrangling over land rights, while raising conservation awareness. Supported by the Vatican, this collaboration is a new step forward for protecting the Amazon.

The Catholic Church is potentially a huge force in wildlife conservation. It has more than one billion members and its influence is even wider – it has a single figurehead who is a global superstar with the ear of many world leaders, as well as a unified structure with an efficient system for disseminating information. Consider the impact of Pope Francis’s environmental encyclical Laudato Si, published in the run-up to the COP21 climate conference in Paris last December. Widely praised, it is both powerful and moving.

Laudato Si gives Catholics the mandate to act for species conservation: “Greater investment needs to be made in research aimed at understanding more fully the functioning of ecosystems and adequately analysing the different variables associated with any significant modification of the environment. Because all creatures are connected, each must be cherished with love and respect, for all of us as living creatures are dependent on one another. Each area is responsible for the care of this family. This will require undertaking