Doctor of FrancisChurch
At the National Catholic Reporter fighting Global Warming is as Catholic as Catholic gets. Here are some segments:
The call to stewardship of creation, for Catholic and Judeo-Christians alike, extends from our most recent popes and goes all the way back to Genesis and the story of Noah.
Global warming caused that flood too!
In his teachings, Jesus often spoke of God as father of all, creator and caretaker, and especially householder “In my Father’s house there are many dwelling places. If there were not, would I have told you that I am going to prepare a place for you?” he said in John’s Gospel.
Jesus described God as one who cares for the birds in the field as well as each strand upon our heads. He himself healed and advocated for the vulnerable and those who had been left out, seen as wrong, in debt, unable to speak for themselves or who lacked advocates in the system of their time.
That’s about the most tired and politically correct biblical exegesis I’ve ever heard!
St. Ambrose, the 4th century bishop of Milan, remarked that God cares about all creation, that “the mystery of the Incarnation of God is the salvation of the whole of Creation.”
So save the planet!
“Unless we are able to view things in terms of how they originate, how they are to return to their end, and how God shines forth in them, we will not be able to understand,” Bonaventure said.
So believe in junk science?
Aquinas went on to say, as Christians and sinners, we recognize that sin “has distorted the human relationship with the natural world: We have disturbed the balance of nature in radical and violent ways. Sin damages our relationship with God and with one another, the relationships between social groups, and that between humanity and earth.”
A quick review of history shows times when humanity has gotten off-track from its valuing of creation. The Industrial Revolution brought with it many goods and allowed for the formation of modern civilization. At the same time, it brought pollution of the air and water sources, and is viewed as a trigger to climate change.
Sin distorted the balance of nature and sinful people caused the industrial revolution, therefore sin caused global warming? Atone!
A couple hundred years earlier, in the 15th century, papal edicts forming the Doctrine of Discovery authorized European Christian nations to “invade, search out, capture, vanquish, and subdue all Saracens [Muslims] and pagans whatsoever, and other enemies of Christ wheresoever placed … to reduce their persons to perpetual slavery,” and to seize their possessions and property. This mentality, embedded in the European worldview and the legal codes of the lands they colonized, gave justification for denying indigenous peoples their rights, as well as respecting the rights of the land itself.
Do you believe that? It sounds like a group of papal edicts may have morphed a bit during their grouping and then a few relevant things fell out.
John Paul noted in his 1990 World Day of Peace message that “there is a growing awareness that world peace is threatened not only by the arms race, regional conflicts and continued injustices among peoples and nations, but also by a lack of due respect for nature, by the plundering of natural resources and by a progressive decline in the quality of life… Faced with the widespread destruction of the environment, people everywhere are coming to understand that we cannot continue to use the goods of the earth as we have in the past.”
He continued: “The gradual depletion of the ozone layer and the related ‘greenhouse effect’ has now reached crisis proportions as a consequence of industrial growth, massive urban concentrations and vastly increased energy needs… The ecological crisis reveals the urgent moral need for a new solidarity.”
A perfect example of the limits of papal wisdom and jurisdiction. Whatever happened to that ozone hole anyway?
Climate change is addressed specifically in the Vatican’s Compendium of the Social Doctrine of the Church (paragraph 470), which says the relationship between human activity and global warming must be constantly monitored, for “The climate is a good that must be protected.”
I’m not sure how much Catholics need to pay attention to this lengthy production from the Council for Justice and Peace, but the paragraph actually says this:
Programs of economic development must carefully consider “the need to respect the integrity and the cycles of nature” [989] because natural resources are limited and some are not renewable. The present rhythm of exploitation is seriously compromising the availability of some natural resources for both the present and the future.[990] Solutions to the ecological problem require that economic activity respect the environment to a greater degree, reconciling the needs of economic development with those of environmental protection. Every economic activity making use of natural resources must also be concerned with safeguarding the environment and should foresee the costs involved, which are “an essential element of the actual cost of economic activity”.[991] In this context, one considers relations between human activity and climate change which, given their extreme complexity, must be opportunely and constantly monitored at the scientific, political and juridical, national and international levels. The climate is a good that must be protected and reminds consumers and those engaged in industrial activity to develop a greater sense of responsibility for their behaviour.
I don’t see the term ‘global warming’ anywhere. I just see the warning to monitor the complex climate to ensure it is protected. It doesn’t say partner with the UN to lie and agitate about impending climate doom for selfish, nefarious, and anti-Christian purposes.
There’s nothing Catholic about that and I’m sure Noah would be against it.