Taking up the challenges of His Holiness Pope Francis’ encyclical letter, Laudato sì: On Care for Our Common Home, The Laudato sì Challenge—now in its fifth year— supports measurable and time-bound solutions to the global challenges outlined in Laudato sì. We strive to implement concrete solutions to care for our common home and empower vulnerable people to “be the protagonist in their own solution,” supporting the vision of the Sustainable Development Goals of “being a human dignity narrative that leaves no one behind.” The Laudato sì Challenge (LSC) is a new kind of enterprise. Our foundational stone and light of inspiration are Pope Francis’ encyclical letter, Laudato sì. This unifying and uplifting document serves as our roots and our wings.
To put the principles of Laudato sì into action, we bring the precision and rigor of the venture philanthropy model together with the clarity, alignment, and time-bound strengths of the “commitment model”—to drive focused, broad and sustainable impact:
- LSC finds and partners with enterprises with bold and innovative solutions to the inextricably linked global challenges of climate change and forced displacement.
- We work with our partner enterprises to co-create Commitments to Impact, which are new, specific, measurable, and time-bound impact initiatives, and we provide capital to support those commitments.
- We bring leaders from the private, public and religious sectors around our four focus commitments per year to help fulfill those commitments, as we learn every day to help our “partner enterprises” scale and build organizational capacity and efficiencies, so they can generate a higher Return of Impact (ROI) over time.
