In July this summer the United Nations held what they call their High-Level Political Forum in which governments report on their efforts to implement within their countries what they are doing to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s). There are 17 different goals and those countries whose turn it is to report, reports on a few that the UN has chosen for this Forum. It was Canada’s turn to report on certain goals.
Sisters Sue Wilson and Joan Atkinson at the UN in New York, as part of a delegation from Canada representing NGOs (Non-Governmental Organizations) from Religious Communities. Pictured left to right: Brentella Williams, Sarah Rudolph' IBVM, Sue Wilson, Joan Atkinson, Varka Kalydzhieva.
A small delegation representing some Canadian Religious Congregations attended.
In preparation for this meeting, some of the religious Congregations that have NGO offices at the UN agreed to submit a report alongside the official Canadian Governments report. The bottom-line conclusion of all the countries that reported was that none of us are doing as well as we had hoped. Part of this slow progress was due to the impact of the Covid pandemic, and the world economy to recover. However, what is uplifting about the sessions we attended was the very positive aspiration of countries to do better. I always come away from the meetings at the UN feeling we remain very hopeful with a commitment to keep trying to do better.
The below video link from the UN website is worth the time to watch and despite all the problems we see and hear about around the globe there is also a very dedicated group of people who are committed to keep working to improve our world.
-Sister Joan Atkinson, CSJ