We are vewy, vewy bad
Is it any wonder why I no longer belong to Holy Mother Church?
Industrialized nations must recognize their responsibility for the environmental crisis, shed their consumerism and embrace more sober lifestyles, Pope Benedict said on Tuesday.
The pope's call for more environmental commitments came in his message for the Roman Catholic Church's annual World Day of Peace, to be marked on Jan 1 and whose theme is "If You Want to Cultivate Peace, Protect Creation."
You're reading it wrong, George. He acknowledges that we should take the environment into consideration (who doesn't think we should?) while at the same time establishing the correct order of importance, people before nature:
http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/new.php?n=18058
We must not succumb to the "notions of the environment inspired by eco-centrism and bio-centrism" because these "eliminate the difference of identity and value between the human person and other living things," the Pontiff warns in his message.
Responding to the attitudes of some environmental groups, Pope Benedict cautions against assuming an "egalitarian vision of the 'dignity' of all living creatures," since this mentality causes the "distinctiveness and superior role of human beings" in the world to cease carrying weight.
-Nelson
My reason was because I got saved, but I also saw the hypocrisy and diversions of the church when I was there. The pope had no time for Cuban freedom fighters, but he has time for the farce that is global warming. He is simply in the recruiting mode.
this is consistent with previous encyclicals and statements from the Church.
I guess this cinches it. Al Gore will be canonized but while still living so that he can put whatever 'trophy' the Pope gives him on the shelf next to the NPP, Oscar, and his Gore-Lieberman 2002 bumper sticker collection.
I am on the same page as Pototo. True faith first, then politics.
"...shed their consumerism and embrace more sober lifestyles..." says the man who lives in a city of gold.
...as Lazaro pointed out, the hypocrisy is deafening. Let's all leave our capitalist lifestyles that allow us to donate to the church that would have us all be obedient peasants.
Man, the pope sounds like Obama. Do as I say not as I do.
And yet people still do not see through either farce.
As an adult, one of the worst and biggest arguments I ever had with me Mum was over NOT putting all my trust in clergy at any level in the Church. She is of the age old understanding that The Pope is infallible. If you look into the Roman Catholic Church's history we find Popes were and are mere men. Even Peter had his faults. They were not meant to be deified here on Earth. They were meant to interpreted The Word of God and to act as the Holy Father of the 'flock' that followed that Word. To keep our focus.
Not to defame the Catholic Church, of which I still check-off that box, but their history of self-serving politics over the centuries have been documented. Any 'group' or religion in man's history has played politics to their convenience and advantage. The Catholic Church of old was not immune to this. Even today the Vatican has practiced "picking and choosing" when to stretch its political muscles. And while you might expect them to be conservative in the real sense of the word, and use a more common sense approach, they don't seem to, opting rather to toss up that shield of 'pacifism' when things get down to bullets and blood, or finding way too much compassion for those who cannot repent their evil ways of murder and destruction.
And on that note, I am not encouraged by The Holy Father jumping on the liberal and leftist altar of Gaia. Without business, industry, and capitol not only do Church tithings drop but civilization's ways and means of life drop. There were far more wars in the world when we were all poor and wallowing in the dirt huts.
BTW, I am sure you all know about Bishop/Saint Malachy's "The Last Pope" prophecy? I'd drop a link but there are so many to look into.
Mega dittos, Lazaro. I grew up church-less (thankfully) till getting saved @ my late teens. Zero hypocrisy with Jesus, who didn't have where to lay his head.
According to Saint Malachy, the next Pope will be the last Pope and his name will be Petrus Romanus -- Peter of Rome.
Well personally I am still a committed Catholic, though I definitely disagree with any argument which suggests that the world should sign on to the Copenhagen madness.
I agree with Pope Benedict that the industrialized world should recognize its responsibility for the environmental crisis, but two questions then follow, "What is the nature of the current environmental crisis?" and "What is the industrialized world's responsibility to address it?"
And my answers are that there is an environmental crisis of toxic pollution and the industrialized world must own up to its responsibility for its discharge of toxic emissions and pollutants. But that responsibility is less than that of the developing world, which pollutes far more than its industrialized counterpart and that the main responsibility of the industrialized world is to help the developing world enact and implement controls on their own excesses. As now envisioned, Copenhagen does exactly the opposite, since it pretty much gives the developing world a free pass.
And obviously toxicity is not what Copenhagen is all about. It's about climate change and the industrialized world is NOT responsible for an overall global warming trend that goes back to the mid-14th century and which now may be turning in the opposite direction according to some recent investigations.
Somewhere underneath all of this should be a finding by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences and I would like to know what that is and where I can read it. The Vatican has some excellent scientific minds in its employ and I would prefer to see the particulars of what they say before I interpret Pope Benedict's very generalized statement (as I read it) to mean that the Catholic Church endorses the worst of Copenhagen, because my examination of the Church's recent record on scientific issues tells me that they usually do rather well.
But I will also admit that I fear that there may be some expression of the Catholic Church's desire to see resources transferred to the developing world via the vehicle now offered by the Copenhagen climate change negotiations. We must get resources, and particularly capital assets, into the hands of the developing world to ensure their progress towards modernity, but that can only be predicated upon our receipt of the political assurances that those resources will be used as intended. And those political assurances MUST begin with democratic reforms that protect and promote real human rights and which enable the growth of genuine freedom, not the version the UN has thus far supported.
Democracy and human freedom first, then the support of civilization--not the other way around.
StJacques
StJacques Online: A Freedom Blog