The Church and the Climate

A large constituency of American Catholics — like the American public at large — prize highly those things which they hold to be matters of personal freedom. Many of them would much sooner tell the Church to mind her own business than to allow her teachings to guide what goes on in their bedrooms, Internet histories, or ovaries. Such Catholics will not be comforted to learn that the Church has something to say about their gas tanks, too.

Al Gore warns of the imminent threat of the ManBearPig

In the United States, we hear such a varied and erratic collection of voices surrounding the issue dealt with in this week's post that we hardly know where to start. Not even the nomenclature is settled. Sometimes we hear it called climate change, other times global warming. Sometimes qualifiers like man-made and anthropogenic are tacked on to the front; oftentimes, dirty words like hoax or swindle are tacked on to the back. We're not sure who to trust. From time to time we hear a dubious term like greenhouse effect be thrown around, and it's sometimes difficult to distinguish the global warming  thing from the ozone layer thing that everyone used to talk about. First we hear people say that global warming will fry us up in a great ball of flame 10 years down the road. Then another seemingly trustworthy source will inform us that there has been no warming trend and there's nothing to worry about at all. Finally, another earnest voice lets us know that all that about the ball of flame might be true, but there's no need to concern ourselves with it because it's all a part of a natural cycle and there's nothing we can do about it anyway. First we hear that scientists made it all up to win some grant money, and then we hear that oil companies only made up that it was all made up. And then when we hear that an "independent investigation" settled the matter once and for all, we balk at idea of trusting an investigation done by that organization, breathlessly deploring the intergovernmental organization, university, or think tank in question as the one most worthy of our disdain. We begin to wonder if there is such a thing as a third party at all. The roots of this insanity run deep.

Gratitude in Action

This film, called "The Story of Stuff," has been circulating among environmentalists for the past few years and can help us make sense of what's wrong with consumerist culture:

I would encourage you NOT to watch the whole thing for now, as it would distract from our discussion, but just focus on the footage from 10:37 to 16:45.

The tone is quite biting, but it nicely lays out some realities we live with every day but don't recognize. As  Ms. Leonard says, our economy relies on waste. The intent of advertising is to make us feel discontent with what we have so we buy more. Economic growth relies on waste of resources, on constant production for production's sake.

The Other Abstinence

It's not the kind you learned about in Sunday School (well, maybe you did). It's definitely not the kind you learned about in health class (if you learned about any kind at all). This kind of abstinence is the spiritual practice of abstaining from meat. The Church gives it to us as a requirement on Fridays during Lent. It is a discipline that, when done in a spirit of charity, brings us closer to Christ.

Keeping regular days of abstinence from meat, especially on Fridays, has been practiced and enforced by the Church from the very beginning. It is so essential for the life of the Church because of its many benefits: it is an act of penance in communion with all of the faithful; it reminds us of the flesh of Christ sacrificed for us; and it helps us to prepare ourselves for the celebration of His resurrection every Sunday.