Development and Peace-Caritas Canada has officially launched its Share Lent 2026 campaign, giving faithful across the country another chance for prayer, education, donations and solidarity with the Global South. 

The campaign kicked off Feb. 21 with a national webinar sharing insight into this year’s theme, “On Track for Justice,” a play on words tied to this year’s Brazilian partner Justiça nos Trilhos (Justice on Rails). There, attendees were able to learn more about D&P’s beautiful tradition for Catholics across Canada to educate, unify and respond to the needs of brothers and sisters worldwide. This year, the identified communities are those along Brazil’s Carajás railway.   

For Luke Stocking, director of public engagement at Development and Peace-Caritas Canada, the Lenten season offering continues to shine as one of the organization's main methods of concretizing love in a tangible way. 

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“Share Lent is a gift that the bishops of Canada gave in creating Development and Peace as this one unifying moment that we have as the Church. It’s a way that we make that love that we have for the poorest among us something real,” he said.

This year’s campaign hopes to build on last year’s Jubilee-focused initiative that saw 59 projects across 34 different countries reach more than seven million people. Expanded from last year’s focus on financial debt relief to include ecological debt, On Track for Justice hopes to highlight the plundering of Global South resources that, in turn, fuels global inequality.

“ Our partner was founded by the Comboni missionary Fr. Dario Bossi, a close advisor of the bishops in Brazil on many different commissions. The work they do is a beautiful expression of how we always must see the people who are affected by poverty as the subjects and not objects of development,” Stocking said. 

“This is about respecting what those affected want for themselves, and to walk side by side and help them to realize their dreams for their own lives. I think that project is indicative of the way we approach development work throughout the whole world.” 

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Even as a major fundraising source for D&P, Share Lent continues to pride itself as a spiritually in-touch and education-backed initiative. Solidarity Sunday, taking place on March 22 this year, is the culmination of Share Lent, rather than a one-off collection, with a multitude of resources available throughout Lent to spiritually guide the campaign. These include weekly Scripture reflections, newsletter updates, digital and print tools, bulletin announcements and the ever-popular Way of the Cross opportunities for parishes. 

These resources reflect opportunities compiled on the campaign’s Solidarity Calendar, with Stocking sharing that oversized versions have been provided for nearly 500 registered schools in D&P's schools program to follow along with over the next 40 days. 

“ The idea is to spiritually nourish the Lenten journey of Catholics as well, which has always been an important objective of the campaign,” he said, reflecting on the more than 50-year history of Share Lent. 

Significant funds are raised for D&P each Share Lent, with last year’s target of $6.5 million remaining for 2026. 

While times remain hard for all Canadians, Stocking shared the opportunity for a matched donation through separate monthly donations that provide over $1.6 million annually in stable income for D&P’s projects, with all new monthly donors being matched dollar-for-dollar thanks to an anonymous donor between Ash Wednesday and Pentecost. 

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“ It warms my heart as a Catholic to see, every year, other people of goodwill engage in it, which reaffirms my faith. Fundamentally, part of what it is to be Catholic is to remember, care and express our love and solidarity with the most impoverished peoples, and so the way the Church in Canada responds to that cry of the poor and Earth each year is an annual reaffirmation of my belief in the goodness of the Church and its care for the human family,” Stocking said. 

See devp.org.