10 key excerpts from Pope Francis's encyclical on the environment
Pope Francis attends an audience with Scouts in St. Peter's Square on June 13, 2015 in Vatican City, Vatican. (Photo by Franco Origlia/Getty Images)
By Sarah Pulliam Bailey
Pope Francis is calling for an "ecological conversion" for the faithful in his sweeping new encyclical on the environment. In "Laudato Si," or "Be Praised" (or "Praised Be,") he warns of harming birds and industrial waste and calls for renewable fuel subsidies and energy efficiency.
Here are some of the key passages people will read closely, everything from climate change and global warming to abortion and population control.
1) Climate change has grave implications. "Each year sees the disappearance of thousands of plant and animal species which we will never know, which our children will never see, because they have been lost forever," he writes.
Metropolitan of Pergamon John Zizioulas delivers in English a presentation on Pope Francis's environmental encyclical. (The Vatican English)
2) Rich countries are destroying poor ones, and the earth is getting warmer. "The warming caused by huge consumption on the part of some rich countries has repercussions on the poorest areas of the world, especially Africa, where a rise in temperature, together with drought, has proved devastating for farming."
3) Christians have misinterpreted Scripture and "must forcefully reject the notion that our being created in God's image and given dominion over the earth justifies absolute domination over other creatures."
4) The importance of access to safe drinkable water is "a basic and universal human right."
5) Technocratic domination leads to the destruction of nature and the exploitation of people, and "by itself the market cannot guarantee integral human development and social inclusion."
6) Population control does not address the problems of the poor. "In the face of the so-called culture of death, the family is the heart of the culture of life." And, "Since everything is interrelated, concern for the protection of nature is also incompatible with the justification of abortion."
7) Gender differences matter, and "valuing one's own body in its femininity or masculinity is necessary if I am going to be able to recognize myself in an encounter with someone who is different."
8) The international community has not acted enough: "recent World Summits on the environment have not lived up to expectations because, due to lack of political will, they were unable to reach truly meaningful and effective global agreements on the environment." He writes, "the Church does not presume to settle scientific questions or to replace politics. But I am concerned to encourage an honest and open debate so that particular interests or ideologies will not prejudice the common good." And, "there is urgent need of a true world political authority, as my predecessor Blessed John XXIII indicated some years ago."
9) Individuals must act. "An integral ecology is also made up of simple daily gestures which break with the logic of violence, exploitation and selfishness," he writes. We should also consider taking public transit, car-pooling, planting trees, turning off the lights and recycling.
10) By the way, why are we here on Earth in the first place? "What kind of world do we want to leave to those who come after us, to children who are now growing up?" he writes.
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Humans' staggering effect on Earth
"If our species had started with just two people at the time of the earliest agricultural practices some 10,000 years ago, and increased by 1 percent per year, today humanity would be a solid ball of flesh many thousand light years in diameter, and expanding with a radial velocity that, neglecting relativity, would be many times faster than the speed of light." —Gabor Zovanyi Sprawling Mexico City, Mexico, population 20 million, density 24,600/mile (63,700/square kilometer), rolls across the landscape, displacing every scrap of natural habitat; © Pablo Lopez Luz (Pablo Lopez Luz)