The United Nations General Assembly takes place in
New York in September and Pope Francis will be addressing it. World leaders will, hopefully, sign up to the
new Sustainable Development Goals. This
follows on from the disappointing Millennium Development Goals and Pope Francis
will obviously be trying to nudge the nations of the world to work harder to
create a fairer human family.
The third Summit will take place in Paris at the
end of the year when world leaders will need to agree specific policies aimed
at tackling climate change. Together these
Summits could help to create a more just and more prosperous world for
generations to come. If these transpire
to be missed opportunities then the outlook is very serious because there have
been so many missed opportunities already.
Through issuing the encyclical ‘Laudato Si’ now the
Pope is trying to keep the focus on tackling poverty and protecting the
environment. Pope Francis is not saying
that he has all the answers. There is no
attempt in the encyclical to pretend that he is offering precise solutions to
lift people out of poverty and ensure that the health of the universe is
protected. What he is trying to do is to
alert leaders worldwide to their responsibilities and indeed to alert each one
of us to our responsibility for we are all stewards of God’s creation and we
are all the keepers of our brothers and sisters.
He draws attention to the fact that there have been
abysmal failures, especially over the past two hundred years, to care for the
earth and only serious and determined measures can prevent disaster. One of the people that Pope Francis invited
to help him in producing this encyclical was the Brazilian liberation
theologian, Leonard Boff. Boff said:
‘Along with the poor, you have to add the earth as the ‘great pauper’ that is
oppressed and devastated. He also
invited Professor John Schellnhuber, Chairman of the German Advisory Council on
Global Climate Change. In an article in
The Guardian twelve years ago Schellnhuber described the consumption of cheap
fossil fuels as ‘a lifestyle of mass destruction.’ Climate Change is accelerating, he warns, and
drastic cuts in global carbon dioxide emissions need to be halved overall by
2050, reduced by 80% to 90% in developed nations and phased out completely by
the end of the century.
Another contributor to this encyclical is Patriarch
Bartholomew of Constantinople. He is the
first among equals of the Christian Orthodox Patriarchs and in 2002 he issued a
joint statement with Pope John-Paul II on environmental and world justice
issues. Cardinal Peter Turkson of Ghana,
who heads the Pontifical Council for Justice and Peace was asked by the Pope to
start work on the Encyclical almost two years ago and he submitted a first
draft nearly a year ago.
So the Encyclical is the work of many hands. It has been very carefully constructed and we
will have it in our shop as soon as possible.
In the meantime let us look at the opening words:” ‘Laudato Si, mi
Signore’ – ‘Praise be to you, my Lord.’
In the words of this beautiful canticle, St Francis of Assisi reminds us
that our common home is like a sister with whom we share our life and a
beautiful mother who opens her arms to embrace us. This sister now cries out to us because the
harm we have inflicted on her by our irresponsible use of the goods with which
God has endowed her. We have come to see
ourselves as her lords and masters, entitled to plunder her at will. The violence present in our hearts, wounded
by sin, is also reflected in the symptoms of sickness evident in the soil, in
the water, in the air and in all forms of life. The destruction of the human
environment is extremely serious, not only because God has entrusted the world
to us men and women but because human life is itself a gift which must be
defended from various forms of debasement.”
