Pope calls for swift action to save planet, help poor
VATICAN CITY: Pope Francis demanded swift action yesterday to save the planet from environmental ruin, urging world leaders to hear “the cry of the earth and the cry of the poor”, and plunging the Catholic Church into political controversy over climate change.
In the first papal document dedicated to the environment, he calls for “decisive action” to stop environmental degradation and global warming, squarely backing scientists who say it is mostly man-made.
In the encyclical, Francis calls for a change of lifestyle in rich countries steeped in “throwaway” consumer culture and an end to “obstructionist attitudes” that put profit before the common good.
The controversial papal pronouncement has won him the wrath of conservatives, including US Republican presidential candidates, who have scolded Francis for delving into science and politics.
But Latin America’s first pope says protecting the planet is a moral and ethical “imperative” that supersedes political and economic interests.
This clarion call to his flock of 1.2 billion members could spur the world’s Catholics to lobby policymakers on ecology issues and climate change.
The Argentine-born pontiff, 78, decries a “myopia of power politics” he said has delayed environmental action, and says “many of those who possess more resources and economic or political power seem mostly to be concerned with masking the problems or concealing their symptoms”.
The release is timed to precede September addresses to the UN and the US Congress on sustainable development.
The pope has said he wants to influence this year’s key UN climate summit in Paris.
Francis dismisses those who argue that “technology will solve environmental problems and that global hunger and poverty will be resolved simply by market growth”.
Francis also dismisses the effectiveness of carbon credits, saying they seemed to be a “quick and easy solution”, but could lead “to a new form of speculation” that maintains excessive consumption and does not allow the “radical change” needed.
“Doomsday predictions can no longer be met with irony or disdain. We may well be leaving to coming generations debris, desolation and filth.
“We need to reflect on our accountability before those who will have to endure the dire consequences.”
Francis calls on humanity to change its lifestyle and production to combat the human causes that aggravate global warming, as well as for policies to “drastically” reduce polluting gases. Technology based on fossil fuels “needs to be progressively replaced without delay” and sources of renewable energy developed.
In a passage certain to upset conservatives, he says a legal framework which can ensure the protection of ecosystems “has become indispensable”.
One of the major themes is the disparity of wealth.
“We fail to see that some are mired in desperate and degrading poverty… while others have not the faintest idea of what to do with their possessions, vainly showing off their supposed superiority and leaving behind them so much waste, which, if it were the case everywhere, would destroy the planet,” he says. – Reuters