In a post
I did captioned “Pope Francis Giving a Boost to Climate Change Fight” dated May
6, 2015, it was indicated that the pope will come out with an encyclical on
climate change in June.
An
encyclical is a circular from a pope to bishops and congregations of the
Catholic Church.
The
encyclical was released on June 18, 2015.
The story
that follows, sourced from http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2015/0618/Pope-Francis-urges-strong-action-on-climate-change, gives highlights of the encyclical and how people are reacting
to them.
In a
sweeping environmental manifesto aimed at spurring concrete
action, Pope Francis called Thursday (June 18, 2015) for a bold
cultural revolution to correct what he described as a "structurally
perverse" economic system where the rich exploit the poor, turning Earth
into an "immense pile of filth."
Francis framed climate change as an urgent moral
issue in his eagerly anticipated encyclical, blaming global warming on an
unfair, fossil fuel-based industrial model that harms the poor most.
Citing Scripture, his predecessors and bishops from around the
world, the pope urged people of every faith and even no faith to
undergo an awakening to save God's creation for future generations.
The document released Thursday was a stinging indictment of big
business and climate doubters alike, meant to encourage
courageous changes at U.N. climate negotiations later this
year, in domestic politics and in everyday life.
"It is not enough to balance, in the medium term, the
protection of nature with financial gain, or the preservation of the
environment with progress," he writes. "Halfway measures simply delay
the inevitable disaster. Put simply, it is a matter of redefining our notion of
progress."
Environmental scientists said the first-ever encyclical, or
teaching document, on the environment could have a dramatic effect on
the climate debate, lending the moral authority of the immensely
popular Francis to an issue that has long been cast in purely political,
economic or scientific terms.
"This clarion call should guide the world toward a strong and
durable universal climate agreement in Paris at the end of this
year," said Christiana Figueres, the U.N.'s
top climate official. "Coupled with the economic imperative, the
moral imperative leaves no doubt that we must act
on climate change now."
Veerabhadran Ramanathan, a Scripps Institution of Oceanography
scientist, said the encyclical is a "game-changer in making people think
about this."
"It's not politics anymore," he said, adding that
science is often difficult to understand but that people respond to arguments
framed by morality and ethics.
The energy lobby was quick to criticize the encyclical's
anti-fossil fuel message.
"The simple reality is that energy is the essential building
block of the modern world," said Thomas Pyle of the Institute of Energy
Research, a conservative free-market group. "The application of affordable
energy makes everything we do — food production, manufacturing, health care,
transportation, heating and air conditioning — better."
Francis said he hoped his effort would lead ordinary people in
their daily lives and decision-makers at the Paris U.N.climate meetings to
a wholesale change of mind and heart, saying "both the cry of
the Earth and the cry of the poor" must now be heard.
"This vision of 'might is right' has engendered immense
inequality, injustice and acts of violence against the majority of humanity,
since resources end up in the hands of the first comer or the most powerful:
the winner takes all," he writes. "Completely at odds with this model
are the ideals of harmony, justice, fraternity and peace as proposed by
Jesus."
The encyclical "Laudato Si," (Praise Be) is 191 pages of
pure Francis.
It's a blunt, readable booklet full of zingers that will make many
conservatives and climate doubters squirm, including in the U.S.
Congress, where Francis will deliver the first-ever papal address in September.
It has already put several U.S. presidential candidates on the hot seat since
some Republicans, Catholics among them, doubt the science behind global warming
and have said the pope should stay out of the debate.
"I don't think we should politicize our faith," U.S.
Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush, a Catholic convert, said on the eve
of the encyclical's release. "I think religion ought to be about making us
better as people and less about things that end up getting into the political
realm."
Yet one of Francis' core points is that there really is no
distinction between human beings, their faith and the environment.
"Everything is related, and we human beings are united as
brothers and sisters on a wonderful pilgrimage, woven together by the love God
has for each of his creatures and which also unites us in fond affection with
brother sun, sister moon, brother river and mother earth," he writes.
Cardinal Peter Turkson, whose office wrote the first draft of the
encyclical, acknowledged that the pope was no expert in science,
although he did work as a chemist before entering the seminary. But he said
Francis was fully justified in speaking out about an important issue and had
consulted widely. He asked if politicians would refrain from talking about
science just because they're not scientific experts.
Francis accepts as fact that the world is getting warmer and that
human activity is mostly to blame.
"The earth, our home, is beginning to look more and more like
an immense pile of filth," he writes.
Citing the deforestation of the Amazon, the melting of Arctic
glaciers and the deaths of coral reefs, he rebukes "obstructionist" climate doubters
who "seem mostly to be concerned with masking the problems or concealing
their symptoms." And he blames politicians for listening more to oil
industry interests than Scripture or common sense.
He praises a "less is more" lifestyle, one that shuns
air conditioners and gated communities in favor of car pools, recycling and
being in close touch with the poor and marginalized. He calls for courageous,
radical and farsighted policies to transition the world's energy supply from
fossil fuels to renewable sources, saying mitigation schemes like the buying
and selling of carbon credits won't solve the problem and are just a "ploy
which permits maintaining the excessive consumption of some countries and
sectors."
What is needed, he says, is a "bold cultural
revolution."
"Nobody is suggesting a return to the Stone Age, but we do
need to slow down and look at reality in a different way, to appropriate the
positive and sustainable progress which has been made, but also to recover the
values and the great goals swept away by our unrestrained delusions of
grandeur," Francis writes.
Some have dismissed the Argentine pope as pushing what
they call Latin American-style socialism, but he answered those critics just
this week, saying it was not a sign of communism to care for the poor.
Within the church, many conservative Catholics have questioned
the pope's heavy emphasis on the environment
and climate change over other issues such as abortion and
marriage.
Francis does address abortion and population issues briefly in the
encyclical, criticizing those in the environmental movement who show concern
for preserving nature but not human lives. The Catholic Church has long been at
odds with environmentalists over how much population growth degrades the environment.
John Schellnhuber, the scientist credited with coming up with the
goal of keeping global warming below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees F), says
it's a "myth" that a growing population is responsible for
environmental decay.
"It's not poverty that destroys the environment," he
told the press conference launching the document. "It's wealth,
consumption and waste. And this is reflected in the encyclical."
Reference:
http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2015/0618/Pope-Francis-urges-strong-action-on-climate-change
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