Laudato Si

Understanding and putting into practice Catholic social teaching is vital to address the challenges of creation stewardship without falling into the environmental activism today that often mimics religious apocalypticism. 

In a message sent in early July to participants of an Italian conference on the consequences of deforestation in the Amazon, Pope Francis said the current situation in the South American rainforest “is a sad paradigm of what is happening in many parts of the planet.”

The world in which our children are growing up is one in which common sense and common ground have been sacrificed for all-or-nothing ideological commitments that lack a consistent application of principles.

Unborn children would face greater health risks if the Environmental Protection Agency moves to rescind a rule regulating hazardous air pollutants emitted by power plants, said the chairmen of two U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ committees.

Speakers at a Vatican conference on sustainable development said the food people choose at the supermarket and cook in their kitchens can make a huge difference in helping address the global problems of hunger, obesity and climate change.

Months after Indonesia’s military was summoned to unclog Jakarta Bay, Archbishop Ignatius Suharyo has joined a chorus of disapproval of the nation’s growing plastic waste problem by calling parishioners to action.

Catholic social teaching has developed over the past century as new problems — human, social, economic and environmental — come clearer into focus and call out for a faith-based response.

While Rome reels from one of its worst droughts in decades, the Vatican is doing its part to conserve water by shutting down the city-state’s 100 fountains.