The Súmate contest was held for the first time in 2021 with the aim of raising awareness of Pope Francis’ encyclical Laudato Si and responding to his invitation to continue caring for our common home. Súmate 2022, sponsored by SURGE and JPIC invited young people between the ages of 14 and 25 to transform a space to create a green space.

Throughout the process, the teams established relationships with another organization or community, which they decided to support. They sent us evidence of their work and we were very excited to see the process of each project.

The teams also participated in two workshops. One on Laudato Si and the other on project creation. We have met people from different places and realities and we have been enriched.

Here are a few words from the team representatives:

“We try to change something that we haven’t done right. You start to think that everything you do is not right, you have to find a way to change and take care of the planet. We learned a lot about how to do a project, how to develop it and not get stuck.”

Nicolás – HOPE – Awareness, separation and garbage collection campaign at Sembradores de Amistad high school, San Luis Potosí, Mexico.

“A happiness to see many teenagers helping with us, coming closer in the way of God and being encouraged to enter the group and clean our ojo de agua. I feel a lot of joy for the support of young people, support from the presidency and the ejidatarios, I will never forget it, we have saved the ojo de agua.”

Christopher and Juan Cristóbal- EcoGap – Recovery of a water eye in Testerazo, Xalisco, Nayarit (Mexico).

“Very happy to have achieved success. We achieved unimaginable accomplishments, we didn’t know much about plant care. We have learned about how to reuse, recycle a lot of things that we might think were already taken for lost to take care of our common home.”

Luhana – CAMYF – Elaboration of vegetable garden in Asentamiento Humano “Nuevo Paraíso” in Nuevo Chimbote, Ancash (Peru). Winning team.