Edgework

I am pleased with Pope Francis’ latest encyclical on the environment and the economy, entitled, “Laudato Sí.” This important paper contributes significantly to Roman Catholic social teaching and is a call, not only to the 1.2 billion Catholics around the world, but indeed to all peoples of the world, to reclaim a relationship with the natural world. In the words of Naomi Klein, this encyclical adds moral weight to a growing call to do something about global warming.

It is worth reading all  184 pages of this document. As Klein says, this is not just another technological paper filled with elitist jargon, but a passionate appeal to the average person. It is at the same time a theological treatise and a poetic masterpiece. It should be read by all because it opens up our hearts and offers a way forward for people of all types of religious faith and even those who profess to have none.

Laudato Sí undergirds the efforts of the South Eastman Transition Initiative here in Steinbach of which I was a founding member about six years ago. Repeatedly, I found Pope Francis speaking the language we have used in our meetings and in our “Rethinking Lifestyles” column in our local paper. My initial response to the encyclical was to tell my Catholic friend, Gabriel, that on one level it made me wish I were Catholic. At least then the leadership of my church would be speaking my language.

In a paper published on June 23, 2015, Laudato Sí and Romano Guardini, Fr. Robert Barron points out that Pope Francis’ thinking has been shaped to a large degree by the great twentieth century theologian and cultural critic, Romano Guardini. Already by the 1920s, Guardini had taken note of “…the emergence of a distinctively modern sensibility.” This, he noted, was the end result of the thinking of philosophers Francis Bacon and René Descarte. Already in the 16th century, “Bacon opined that knowledge is power, more precisely power to control the natural environment. This is why he infamously insisted that the scientist’s task is to put nature ‘on the rack’ so that she might give up her secrets.”

In the 17th century Descarte followed Bacon by telling European intellectuals to stop fussing about theological matters and philosophical abstractions and move on to the challenge of mastering nature. On the one hand, the work of Bacon and Descarte gave rise to modern science and technological advances, but Guardini believed their influence also led to alienation between humanity and nature. “The typically modern subject became aggressive and self-absorbed, and the natural world simply something for him to manipulate for his own purposes.”

Pope Francis sees the present ecological crises in the world emanating from alienated Cartesian subjects carrying on with their work of mastering nature. “In the spirit of the author of the book of Genesis, the Biblical prophets, Irenaeus, Thomas Aquinas, Francis of Assissi – indeed of any great pre-modern figure – Pope Francis wants to recover a properly cosmological sensibility, whereby the human being and her projects are in vibrant, integrated relation with the world that surrounds her.”

“What strikes the Pope as self-evident is that the nature we have attempted to dominate, for the past several centuries, has now turned on us, like Frankenstein’s monster. As he put it in a recent press conference, ‘God always forgives; human beings sometimes forgive; but when nature is mistreated, she never forgives.’ These lessons, which he learned many years ago from Romano Guardini, are still worthy of careful attention.”

I will reserve my comments about various specific perspectives and recommendations Pope Francis makes in Laudato Sí for future articles and focus now on what I see as a few more general observations.

In his preliminary comments leading up to the papal conference discussing this encyclical on July 2 and 3, 2015, Professor Schellenbuber of the Potsdam Institute of Climate Impact Research in Germany made some interesting, and I think profound, observations.

First he noted that the Pope had the audacity to speak of the ecological and economic crises in the world at the same time. While some have made the connection between the problems related to ecology and economics before, Pope Francis draws them together in a synergistic way. In other words, he is saying that the ravages coming on the wings of climate change are integrally connected to an economic system that continues to justify dehumanizing poverty and massive global inequality. Treating these as separate phenomena, he insists, does not allow us to get a complete picture of either. And furthermore, he suggests that the problems of the ecological and economic crises must be solved in tandem. Addressing one without the other will always lead to a dead end.

Secondly, Schellenbuber notes the Pope’s frequent references to a “global commons.” The air we breathe, for example, belongs to every living being and it is unjust for anyone to pollute this commonly owned resource for the sake of financial gain. The oceans are another example of a global commons that none can claim to own and do with as they will. Even the energy trapped below the earth’s surface as coal, oil and natural gas really belongs to the whole human race. Understanding the notion of a global commons means that business cannot carry on as usual; new paradigms must be developed to use our common treasures responsibly and for the good of all.

And finally, the Pope declares emphatically that it is the upper and middle classes of the world that have produced the greatest amount of pollution resulting in climate change. And that means that they also bear a greater responsibility than the world’s poor for making the necessary changes to limit climate change.

I suspect that Laudato Sí will provide much needed moral support for people around the world concerned about the global ecological and economic crises the world faces. We will explore more specific dimensions of the encyclical in future essays.