Location: Ministry Home > News > Minister's Speeches > Speech

Notes for remarks

by

The Honourable Leona Dombrowsky
Minister of the Environment

to

Peace and Ecology Garden Dedication

Mother Teresa School, Walkerton
Tuesday, May 31, 2005

(Check against delivery)

Good afternoon.

I am delighted to be with everyone here at Mother Teresa School.

The motto of your school – “Live, Love, Learn” – tells us all we need for a good and productive life.

No one better symbolized these words than Mother Teresa. She dedicated her life to the well-being of others.

In our own small way, we can act in that same spirit to protect the health and well-being of our families, friends and neighbours.

One of the best ways to do this is by working together to protect our precious drinking water and its sources.

Today, we are here to dedicate your beautiful Peace and Ecology Garden to the memory of people whose lives were tragically cut short, and to others who suffered so much following the tragedy that unfolded in Walkerton.

We mourned the events of five years ago all the more because more could and should have been done to prevent them.

This Peace and Ecology Garden will serve as a constant reminder that we can never take our drinking water quality for granted.

Being here at Mother Teresa School, I am reminded that students in Catholic schools often learn about St. Francis of Assisi when they learn about the environment.

It is often said of St. Francis that he had a child-like quality that gave him a special connection to nature.

I also see this connection when I see children like the students of this school.

The message of St. Francis is, of course, for all ages.

Tonight, Walkerton is going to hear from one of the leading environmentalists of our time and someone who has taken the message of St. Francis to heart.

In fact, Robert Kennedy Jr. has said that Saint Francis of Assisi is his hero because, and I quote, “he understood the way that God communicates to us most forcefully is through the fishes and the birds and the trees and that it is a sin to destroy those things.”

People of all faiths understand this sense of nature as a gift from God, and that we have a responsibility to protect it.

Let us all meet our responsibility to be good stewards of our environment.

Let us work together to protect our precious water resources.

Let us honour the victims of Walkerton by ensuring that no other community has to experience the suffering that was endured here.

I want to thank everyone for coming out today, and for allowing me to be part of this special ceremony.

Thank you.

- end -