On 4th October, the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi, Pope Francis published an apostolic exhortation, Laudate Deum (Praise God). This is a summary of that document.
Read more >>Laudate Deum – a summary
Category: Environment
From comfort zone to low-emission zone
We are at the end of the Season of Creation, a special period of prayer and reflection which the Catholic Church observes from 1st September to 4th October each year. This year the Holy Father will publish a new letter on care for creation on Wednesday 4th October, following his 2015 encyclical, Laudato Si’.
Read more >>The Season of Creation – (Faith) responses to (rapid) climate change
There are clear signs e.g. here, here and here that rapid climate change is no longer a possibility that can be dismissed. Indeed, if the analogy of a boiling kettle being a tipping point that is preceded by fizzing as an indicator that the water is about to boil is relevant, current indications might mean that rapid and even runaway climate change is upon us.
Read more >>The Call of Creation
October 4th was the feast of St Francis of Assisi, the patron saint of ecologists and animals. The day brought to an end the season the Catholic Church describes as “The Season of Creation”. The Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales also chose that day to launch a considerably revised, new edition of its teaching document on the environment – The Call of Creation.
Read more >>Corruption and Catholic social thought
Pope Francis has raised, in several of his talks and encyclicals, the problem of corruption. It is surprising how rarely this has featured explicitly in Catholic social teaching more generally because it is a major driver of poverty, injustice and miserable living conditions.
Read more >>If fossil fuel subsidies are to go, politicians will have to show courage
Governments at the recent COP26 conference agreed to accelerate efforts to phase out “inefficient” fossil fuel subsidies. The qualifier is a little worrying, but it is not clear what it means so I will ignore it for the purposes of this article.
Read more >>Fossil fuel companies and Christian institutions – withdraw or engage?
There is increasing pressure on Christian organisations to disinvest from fossil fuel industries, but there is surprisingly little discussion about whether this is a good idea.
Read more >>Property and human dignity – the prophetic message of Pope Leo XIII
There is a temptation to play down those aspects of Rerum novarum which related to private property. This encyclical was really about labour, it is argued. Or it is suggested that the right to property is only a secondary right subject to the universal destination of goods and therefore not important. Still others say it was an encyclical that, in this respect, reflected its time – a period when the Church’s property was under attack from extreme socialists.
Read more >>Fratelli tutti – the rights and wrongs of private property
The top: Singapore, Hong Kong, New Zealand, Finland, UK, Holland, Sweden, Canada.
The bottom: Venezuela, Haiti, Turkmenistan, Somalia, North Korea, Cuba, Bolivia, Yemen.
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Ecological virtue
Pope Francis discusses ecological virtue in Laudato si and provides illustrations of what it might be, in many cases very beautifully; however, he does not provide a systematic account of ecological virtue. That is the aim of this article based on the virtue scheme of Saint Thomas Aquinas. As a prelude to that, it should be noted that all the world religions and many environmental organisations speak in similar terms.
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