{"id":3912,"date":"2015-06-29T20:44:22","date_gmt":"2015-06-29T20:44:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/?p=3912"},"modified":"2016-08-13T22:29:15","modified_gmt":"2016-08-13T22:29:15","slug":"the-pope-plays-his-trump-card-teaching-the-power-of-moral-actions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/the-pope-plays-his-trump-card-teaching-the-power-of-moral-actions\/","title":{"rendered":"The pope plays his trump card: teaching the power of moral actions"},"content":{"rendered":"

Kathleen Dean Moore<\/a>, Oregon State University<\/a><\/em> and Michael Paul Nelson<\/a>, Oregon State University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

When Pope Francis framed climate change as a moral problem and issued a call to conscience, he played a powerful card. That\u2019s because a moral argument trumps \u2013 that is, negates the power of \u2013 the usual, self-serving responses to a call for action on climate, like \u201creducing carbon emissions will cut into my profits\u201d or \u201caddressing climate change requires sacrifices.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fossil-fuel economy creates injustice on a global scale, the pope wrote in his recent Encyclical Laudato Si’<\/a>, an authoritative statement of moral principle. It irredeemably harms the blameless \u2013 the poor, the children, plants and animals, future generations. And so, it is morally wrong. What does \u201cwrong\u201d mean?<\/p>\n

As environmental philosophers, here\u2019s what we think: It means you should wash your hands of it. That\u2019s it. No excuses. From now on, those who want out of the obligation to do what\u2019s right on climate will have to give reasons, reasons more powerful than moral principle. That may not be possible. The fossil-fuel economy now joins the slave economy as moral poison.<\/p>\n

Social unrest<\/h2>\n

In the encyclical, Pope Francis played an entire hand of reasons why we must turn away from the greed-driven, extractive economy based on fossil fuels. It\u2019s a brilliant display of science- and values-based reasoning.<\/p>\n

First and repeatedly, he excoriates the injustice of global warming: \u201cWe can be silent witnesses to terrible injustices if we think that we can obtain significant benefits by making the rest of humanity, present and future, pay the extremely high costs of environmental deterioration.\u201d He appeals to our love of children: \u201cWhat kind of world do we want to leave to those who come after us?\u201d He calls us to honor our duty to care for creation: \u201cThe natural environment is a collective good, the patrimony of all humanity, and the responsibility of everyone.\u201d He speaks of the consequences of failing to act: \u201cOur concern cannot be limited merely to the threat of extreme weather events, but must also extend to the catastrophic consequences of social unrest.\u201d And he bluntly calls out greed and selfishness, urging God to \u201cenlighten those who possess power and money, that they may avoid the sin of indifference.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Linking the social dimension to environmental issues.<\/span>
\nT\u00e2nia R\u00eago\/Ag\u00eancia Brasil<\/a>, CC BY<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Pope Francis spreads his arms to link social and ecological wrongs, the desperate instability of the poor and the fragility of the planet. We have to \u201cintegrate questions of justice in debates on the environment, so as to hear both the cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor.\u201d<\/p>\n

The wholeness of the planet, the interdependence of all beings, calls us to a personal wholeness as well. It is \u201cno longer enough to speak only of the integrity of ecosystems,\u201d Pope Francis declared. \u201cWe have to dare to speak of the integrity of human life.\u201d<\/p>\n

Personal lessons?<\/h2>\n

A life guided by a moral vision is a life of integrity, of wholeness, of consistency between what we believe to be true and just, and what we do.<\/p>\n

People lead lives of integrity when their moral principles are the source of their power and the ground of their decisions. To live justly, because you believe in justice. To live simply, because you don\u2019t believe in taking more than your fair share. To live gratefully, because you believe that life is a gift. That said, what does the Papal Encyclical mean for you and me \u2013 not just for Catholics, but for all people who aspire to lead a life they believe in?<\/p>\n

From a commitment to integrity, at least two things follow, a refusal and an affirmation: First, we must refuse to allow ourselves to be made into agents of harm and destruction in the extractive economy\u2019s war against the world. This requires acts of conscientious refusal, turning away from \u201cthe constant flood of consumer goods that can baffle the mind.\u201d This requires finding, creating, insisting on our right to alternatives to fossil fuels and life-destroying practices.<\/p>\n

Some of this is individual effort. The Pope calls these \u201clittle daily actions\u201d and praises them. \u201cWe must not think that these efforts are not going to change the world. They benefit society, often unbeknownst to us, for they call forth a goodness which, albeit unseen, inevitably tends to spread.\u201d But social problems must be addressed by social action, not by the sum of individual acts, and so we are called to create community networks of resistance and action. And we are called to press our leaders to fulfill their responsibilities.<\/p>\n

Second, we must creatively and collectively re-imagine who we are, we human beings, and how we ought to live. In the dominant culture\u2019s worldview of \u201ctyrannical anthropocentrism,\u201d we imagine ourselves to be essentially \u201cmasters, consumers, ruthless exploiters, unable to set limits on [our] immediate needs.\u201d So it\u2019s easy to imagine only a grey and dystopic future, peopled with walking zombies. But the pope has something far more beautiful in mind, something far more difficult to achieve. He calls it a \u201ccivilization of love.\u201d<\/p>\n

Imagine that the world has been given to us as a gift \u201cwhich we have freely received and must share with others.\u201d Then, \u201cintergenerational solidarity is not an option, but rather a basic question of justice, since the world we have received also belongs to those who will follow us.\u201d This changes everything. It allows us to begin the great work of \u201cplanning a sustainable and diversified agriculture, developing renewable and less polluting forms of energy, encouraging a more efficient use of energy, promoting a better management of marine and forest resources, and ensuring universal access to drinking water.\u201d Let it begin.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

Kathleen Dean Moore<\/a> is Professor Emeritus of Philosophy at Oregon State University<\/a>.
\nMichael Paul Nelson<\/a> is Professor of Environmental Ethics and Philosophy at Oregon State University<\/a>.<\/p>\n

This article was originally published on The Conversation<\/a>.
\nRead the original article<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Kathleen Dean Moore, Oregon State University and Michael Paul Nelson, Oregon State University When Pope Francis framed climate change as a moral problem and issued a call to conscience, he played a powerful card. That\u2019s because a moral argument trumps \u2013 that is, negates the power of \u2013 the usual, self-serving responses to a call […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":40,"featured_media":5984,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[118,36],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3912"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/40"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3912"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3912\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5985,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3912\/revisions\/5985"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/5984"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lifeandnews.com\/articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}