I marvel that ye are so soon removed from him that called
you into the grace of Christ unto another gospel:
Galatians 1:6
"In July, the United Church of Christ delivered a message, urging the clergy to preach on “the moral obligation of our generation to protect God’s creation” and exhorting individuals to take
“Climate change is the biggest ethical, moral and spiritual challenge of our day,” Joan Brown, the executive director of New Mexico Interfaith Power & Light, told me.
She pointed to St. Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of animals and ecology, a medieval Italian monk who spent much of each year living in hermitages, caves and on mountainsides, praying in the wilderness. “St. Francis speaks of everything being connected,” she said, “of there being no separation between the human and natural world.” When Jorge Mario Bergoglio was elected pope, he chose his name in honor of St. Francis. Brown credited Pope Francis with helping reframe climate change as a moral concern.
Laudato Si’ describes the relationship between global poverty, inequality and environmental destruction, and issues a call to action. When Francis visited the White House in 2015, he declared: “Climate change is a problem which can no longer be left to a future generation. I would like all men and women of goodwill in this great nation to support the efforts of the international community to protect the vulnerable in our world.”
Among non-Catholics, too, the pontiff’s message has had an effect: Polling from the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication shows that the number of Americans who say they think global warming will harm the world’s poor rose from 49 to 61 percent; the percent who say the issue has become “very” or “extremely important” to them personally jumped from 19 to 26 percent.
A little over a year later, during the Paris climate negotiations, Brown recalled how during a breakout session for faith leaders, one of the Paris organizers praised Laudato Si’ and the similar documents released by Muslim, Jewish and Buddhist leaders. It was the first time, Brown said, quoting the organizer, “that ethical and moral imperatives are front and center with delegates.”
HighCountryNews
