Enough with fossil fuels, Pope says in latest climate appeal
Psst! Popes have been known to be wrong, from time to time. SH
Enough with fossil fuels, Pope says in latest climate appeal
May 25, 20235:16 AM CDTUpdated 9 hours ago
VATICAN CITY, May 25 (Reuters) - The world must rapidly ditch fossil fuels and end "the senseless war against creation", Pope Francis said on Thursday, in a fresh plea over climate change that called on people to repent for their "ecological sins".
Francis has made the protection of the environment a cornerstone of his pontificate, noting in his landmark 2015 "Laudato Si" (Praised Be) encyclical that the planet was "beginning to look more and more like an immense pile of filth".
In a message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, he said a U.N. climate summit meeting in Dubai on Nov. 30-Dec.12 "must listen to science and institute a rapid and equitable transition to end the era of fossil fuel".
"According to the commitments undertaken in the Paris Agreement to restrain global warming, it is absurd to permit the continued exploration and expansion of fossil fuel infrastructures," he added.
"The unrestrained burning of fossil fuels and the destruction of forests are pushing temperatures higher and leading to massive droughts," Francis said, also criticising oil and gas fracking and "unchecked mega-mining projects".
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Francis, an Argentine who is the first pope to hail from the so-called Global South, denounced global inequalities and said that "consumerist greed, fuelled by selfish hearts, is disrupting the planet's water cycle".
Through the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, Catholics are urged to offer special prayers for the planet. It is observed on Sept. 1, but it is customary for the papal message linked to it to be released months in advance.
As well as quoting from "Laudato Si", the document cites previous popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI, indicating that Francis' pro-environment focus stands in continuity with his more conservative predecessors.
We are all pro environment. The Pope is a revered spiritual leader and I do follow his advice to pray for the planet. I pray that all people can one day move out of energy poverty. I pray one day that no one ever needs to burn dung for fuel. I pray that everyone on the planet has enough energy to drink clean water, have the time freed up to learn about and practice modern farming principles. I pray for a world where everyone reaches the level of wealth enjoyed by the wealthiest nations so that they can worry about a changing environment rather than how they will sustain themselves for the next season or the next day. None of this can happen with less energy or energy that only turns on with the sun.
We are not all for current environmental policy. We can choose to be for human flourishing and freedom or to be under the subjugation of the elite. I propose that swift elimination of fossil fuels will promote the latter not the former. If there were a power source ready to replace the 80% of energy that fossil fuels supplies allowing for the standard of living for all in the world to increase, then I would be jumping on board. The song being written however is about the end of plenty and de-growth. This is a dirge that leads to misery and death. It’s a song that has played out before and failed each time because man yearns for freedom. Freedom is built into our souls. I am onboard to a transition away from fossil fuels for electricity when the de-growth crowd gets on board with nuclear. Of course they won’t, because it does not fit the agenda of de-growth because it really works. Even if that happens there is still that pesky 60% of energy that is not accounted for by solar and wind. Or about how we will supply the materials that are critical to our modern society and only derived from the slag off the bottom of the oil barrel after gasoline and diesel are refined. Or how we can distill the materials needed for solar and wind out of the air rather than the largest mining endeavor since man became a species. I’m on board after these small issues are resolved.