Our Physical Environment

A: Yes. Ecological issues were introduced to CST by Pope Saint John Paul II in his 1991 encyclical Centesimus Annus wherein he said “In his desire to have and to enjoy rather than to be and to grow, man consumes the resources of the earth and his own life in an excessive and disordered way…In this regard, humanity today must be conscious of its duties and obligations towards future generations.” (Pope St. John Paul, 37)

Pope Benedict XVI, while not usually recognized for it, reiterated and strengthened this concern for the environment – a concern he expressed consistently throughout his pontificate – saying: “The earth is a precious gift of the Creator, who has designed its intrinsic order, thus giving us guidelines to which we must hold ourselves as stewards of his creation…In my recent Encyclical, Caritas in Veritate, I referred more than once to such questions.” (General Audience, August 26, 2009) Pope Benedict XVI also made this topic the theme for his 2010 World Day of Peace Message wherein he made the most developed magisterial case, to that point, on the topic of the environment.

Pope Francis has now dedicated an entire encyclical (Laudato Si’) to this wherein he expresses his “hope that this Encyclical Letter, which is now added to the body of the Church’s social teaching, can help us to acknowledge the appeal, immensity and urgency of the challenge we face.” (Laudato Si’, 15)

Pope Francis ‘elevated the bar’ with this: “Working for a just distribution of the fruits of the earth and human labor is not mere philanthropy. It is a moral obligation. For Christians, the responsibility is even greater: it is a commandment.” (Address to the Second World Meeting of Popular Movements, 3.1) 

Pope St. John Paul II directly tied this “commandment” to Catholic social teaching when he called for the Church to announce “Christ to leaders, men and women alike, insisting especially on the formation of consciences on the basis of the Church’s social doctrine.” (Ecclesia in America, 67)

A: Pope Benedict XVI said, “the formation of just structures…belongs to the world of politics”. (Deus Caritas Est, 29)

Pope Francis has “raised the stakes”: “Politics is an essential means of building human community and institutions”. (World Day of Peace, 2019)

“We, Christians, cannot ‘play Pilate’ and wash our hands…We must participate in politics because politics is one of the highest forms of charity because it seeks the common good. And Christian lay people must work in politics.” (Address to the Students of the Jesuit Schools of Italy and Albania, 7 June 2013)

Pope Francis also recognizes that this “is not easy; politics has become too tainted. But I ask myself: Why has it become tainted? Because Christians have not participated in politics with an evangelical spirit? …To work for the common good is a Christian duty, and many times the way in which to work towards it is through politics.” (ibid.)

A: Clearly, in the U.S., the answer is ‘yes’. One political party committed the country to a significant international accord on the topic and has proposed a “Green New Deal” which would allocate tremendous resources to it; the other party has withdrawn the U.S. from the international accord and opposes the other party’s current proposals.

A: We must internalize Catholic social teaching. Then, having formed our conscience on it, we must, by duty and in charity, actively engage in the secular world.

We should follow Pope Saint John Paul II’s call to form our conscience on CST and then engage the world with its tenets. This commitment entails addressing issues starting fromCatholic social teaching principles rather than from positions. Here, “people of goodwill” can/should dialogue and can disagree on “positions” – as long as their prudential judgement is well formed with a deep internalization of Catholic social teaching principles.