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Pope Francis’ Climate Change Encyclical, “Laudato Si”

Pope Francis’ Climate Change Encyclical, “Laudato Si”

The papal teaching will not change the climate of global warming politics.

A leaked version of the climate change encyclical written by Pope Francis ignited a storm of controversy earlier this week.

The unexpected leak of Pope Francis’ much-anticipated environmental encyclical has meant the return of something that not long ago was fairly common around the Vatican but had become often dormant during the two-plus years of Francis’ mostly charmed papacy: intrigue.

Who leaked it and why? Was this the work of frustrated conservatives in the Vatican, as some experts have speculated? Does it portend big fights at a pivotal October meeting in which church officials are expected to grapple with homosexuality and divorce? Or is it just a tempest in a teapot?

“Somebody inside the Vatican leaked the document with the obvious intention of embarrassing the pope,” said Robert Mickens, a longtime Vatican expert and editor of Global Pulse, an online Catholic magazine.

In the wake of this incident, the Vatican revoked the credentials of Sandro Magister, the Italian journalist who has been reporting on the behind-the-scenes development of the papal document.

The draft disparaged free market principles while indicating “global governance” as a solution to the politically created climate change crisis. Yet, climate expert Anthony Watts and his team had a chance to review the material in detail, noting it was a “damp squib“. Intriguingly, the leaked document also called carbon credit trading a “ploy.”

The official document has now been released, and the assessment that it is a moist firecraker with little explosive charge seems to be correct. The Guardian offers an extract of the 184 page papal teaching. Sadly, Pope Francis buys completely into the politicized science of global warming and completely dismisses the serious challenges to the supposed “consensus”.

A very solid scientific consensus indicates that we are presently witnessing a disturbing warming of the climatic system. In recent decades this warming has been accompanied by a constant rise in the sea level and, it would appear, by an increase of extreme weather events, even if a scientifically determinable cause cannot be assigned to each particular phenomenon. Humanity is called to recognise the need for changes of lifestyle, production and consumption, in order to combat this warming or at least the human causes which produce or aggravate it. It is true that there are other factors (such as volcanic activity, variations in the Earth’s orbit and axis, the solar cycle), yet a number of scientific studies indicate that most global warming in recent decades is due to the great concentration of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen oxides and others) released mainly as a result of human activity.

However, all is not lost. The radicalized approach to solving the supposed climate crisis is derided by the Pope, too.

The same mindset which stands in the way of making radical decisions to reverse the trend of global warming also stands in the way of achieving the goal of eliminating poverty. A more responsible overall approach is needed to deal with both problems: the reduction of pollution and the development of poorer countries and regions.

Happily, the reference to the carbon credit trading ploy made it into the final version.

Many conservatives will be pleased, however, because Francis also included a strong criticism of abortion while also belittling the argument that population control represented a solution to limited resources and poverty. However, he sharply criticized carbon credits — the financial instruments now central to the European Union’s current climate change policy — as a tool that “may simply become a ploy which permits maintaining the excessive consumption of some countries and sectors.”

The title of the encyclical is “Laudato Si’,” or “Praise Be to You”. And while elite media and climate change promoters heaping praise on Pope Francis today, careful reading and interpretation will mean some of the hot air will be taken out of their overinflated tires and the wind taken out of their misdirected sails.

In fact, this process has already started:

WCA [World Coal Association] chief executive Benjamin Sporton told AP that to address the developing needs of poor countries, “we need to have affordable reliable energy, and coal is a key part of achieving that.”

…The encyclical says high-polluting technologies based on fossil fuels — “especially coal, but also oil and, to a lesser degree, gas” need to be progressively replaced. But it also says that until renewable energy sources are widely accessible, “it is legitimate to choose the lesser of two evils to find short-term solutions.”

So, In the end, “Laudato Si”, will not significantly change the climate of global warming politics.

And, in looking at the final product, perhaps the team of climate experts who staged a counter-conference to challenge the politicized science during the encyclical’s preparation made more of a difference than originally thought.

If so, “Praise Be”!

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Comments

I would advise him to stick to saving souls and leave the junk science to left wing politicians.

    Not A Member of Any Organized Political in reply to Sanddog. | June 18, 2015 at 4:29 pm

    But he can’t save his own soul – all that filthy lucre to be made selling out you know. He’s Democrat bought and owned!
    Snark!

    InEssence in reply to Sanddog. | June 18, 2015 at 8:31 pm

    “Junk” science implies that a scientific explanation is made, but the global warming theory does not have a scientific principle to stand on. For example, “Greenhouse Gas” is an oxymoron. Greenhouses allow radiation and inhibit convection. Any gas that inhibits convection is by definition, not a gas. Their concept of carbon “load” is actually an averaging process. Nothing is heated. The global warming crowd argues that science is a democracy. As if enough scientists condemn gravity, then gravity evil. But democracy is not a scientific principle.

It will be amazing how many atheist climate Nazi’s who have never believed a word this pope or his church has ever said will take this as, well….. gospel truth.

Freddie Sykes | June 18, 2015 at 1:06 pm

Everybody has an opinion but, according to Catholic teachings, the Pope’s opinion on non-doctrinal issues is worth no more that that of anyone else.

If any progressive points to this as if it bears extra weight, asked them whether that means they also accept church teachings on other issues such as marriage, abortion, et al.

    Whitewall in reply to Freddie Sykes. | June 18, 2015 at 1:08 pm

    Nope, for “progressives” it is only a la carte.

    Midwest Rhino in reply to Freddie Sykes. | June 18, 2015 at 1:24 pm

    That may be true, but that’s like saying don’t buy Nike, because Michael Jordan has no authority in making shoes.

    The problem is he has influence, and this influence is tied in with a greater globalist/Marxist agenda.

    http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/06/13/climate-expert-marxists-global-warming-extremists-control-vatican/

    Most won’t care whether the Pope is conferred with direct from God papal authority over such matters. They will be moved by his direction.

    Freddie: A point I have been making often today, trying to explain “ex cathera” and the “Doctrine of Infallibility” to non-Catholic liberals today. Thanks for making it here, too.

    Henry Hawkins in reply to Freddie Sykes. | June 18, 2015 at 4:42 pm

    To believe that AGW is real because the pope says so is the logical fallacy of the ‘appeal to authority’. His endorsement of AGW is meaningless. May meteorologists now opine on Catholic doctrinal issues? Why not? It’s the same thing in reverse.

    This pope is another world leader using a position of great power as a bully pulpit for purely personal politics.

    Midwest Rhino in reply to Freddie Sykes. | June 18, 2015 at 6:37 pm

    Noah foretold the flood (even if it’s just a story), so there is precedence for men of God to predict the weather. Those that believe in revelation believe in some sort of apocalyptic events, so global weather extremes play into that psyche. The faithful might believe their spiritual guru about some coming global catastrophe. They believe his authority is God.

    Perhaps for Catholics the Pope does not speak “from the throne” when not speaking doctrine, but Christianity in general grants “men of God” broader authority. Those Holy men of the Bible spoke, after all … the scribes wrote. In any case, a Pope’s encyclical will, in practice, have some weight.

    Only Gore is bold enough to turn climatology into an AGW religion of its own, with his CO2 version accepted on faith alone.

      American Human in reply to Midwest Rhino. | June 19, 2015 at 2:33 pm

      MW, I am one of those who believes the Noah and the Ark story is true. However Noah only predicted the flood because he received revelation from God. He didn’t think it up on his own and pull it off like Algore.
      I don’t pay too much attention to what the Pope does. I sort of give him the benefit of the doubt because he’s supposed to be one of the good guys.
      One of my questions to him is: Isn’t the purpose of Christianity to achieve Salvation through the Atonement of Jesus Christ? How can we achieve Salvation by saving the Planet? The poor have no special dispensation for Salvation just because they’re poor. The Savior said that it was easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than it was for a rich man to go to Heaven, he didn’t say it was impossible, just hard. Rich men in those days were usually Lords and landowners and government types. Not particularly humble. The humility is what a rich man would need, not poverty.

The Pope needs to stick to ridding the Church of pedophile priests as well as atone for so much of the poverty they have helped maintain in third world countries.

    Ragspierre in reply to Whitewall. | June 18, 2015 at 1:25 pm

    The last few decades under the Pax Americana and the expansion of capitalism into Asia (including India) has seen the most vigorous roll-back of poverty in the history of the world.

    It has also…despite the explosion of Islamist terrorism…seen the expansion of a SAFE environment for people.

    All of that has been placed in jeopardy by teh Obamic Decline.

healthguyfsu | June 18, 2015 at 3:48 pm

“In the wake of this incident, the Vatican revoked the credentials of Sandro Magister, the Italian journalist who has been reporting on the behind-the-scenes development of the papal document.”

So you might say they pulled an Obama.

Mexico has some major spiritual issues that need to be addressed by a catholic pope and certainly before any more nonsense about AGW wastes his time.

I don’t think so. Some are happy to see a rational, thoughtful, uncorrupt pope. They may be quietly smiling. But it is you and your fellow travellers that are squirming.

That is what happens when you choose your religion and poltics based on ideology.

    Ragspierre in reply to Deodorant. | June 18, 2015 at 7:50 pm

    …but enough about Nanny Pelosi, Teddy Kennedy, Joe Embidin’, Barracula and MoooOOOoochelle, not to mention the WRONG Rev. Al or the WRONG Rev. Wright.

    What an idiot.

I’d like to apologize for my pope, but I guess it doesn’t work that way. This is a disgusting display of Marxist ideology. It’s a hideous abuse of authority.

Woe to the world because of scandals. For it must needs be that scandals come: but nevertheless woe to that man by whom the scandal cometh.

The pope has every right to speak out about ‘things’. But he has too many populist sycophants and diagonally moving Bishops in the kitchen.