Catholics going "Green"?

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I don’t want to speculate about where that detestable creature George Carlin went after he died, but I think he was absolutely right regarding the enviroment. Go to Google or YouTube and type in this…
Code: 
                George Carlin saving the planet
Then watch the video.

Ironically in speaking of the marvels and complexities of the earth he sort of makes a case FOR the existence of God!

I’m with George on this one!😃 😃 😃 😃
 
Here’s my take on the whole subject:
-It seems that for every scientist who believes in global warming, you can find another who doesn’t. I recently saw one global warming believer quoted as a “scientist”. Upon further examination it turned out he was an economist!
-Some global warming believers feel that the matter has been settled, even though there was really no debate which took place.
-Until scientists can agree, I remain with an open mind.
-Scientist, in my opinion, have not come to an agreement about whether global warming exists at all. In the 1950’s, Popular Science ran a story about the coming ice age.
-Scientists have also not agreed as to whether or not man is the cause of global warming. I remember a scientific study that pointed out that cows emit more greenhouse gasses than automobiles (I’ll leave that up to your imagination…).
-I also feel that this issue has been hijacked as a political issue by the Democrats (starting with Nobel Prize winner Al Gore).
-I further think they will try to use this issue (and here’s why you shouldn’t quote ANYTHING the U.N. has to say) to punish countries such as the U.S. in favor of developing countries (AKA, carbon credits).
-I think the carbon credit issue will also be used to punish (tax) large corporations who happen to be at odds with whoever is in power, and award other companies.
-I also believe in protecting the environment. I am an avid hunter and fisherman, and no one appreciates the environment like sportsmen/women.
-I recycle, have my own garden, and all of our biodegradable waste (well, not actually all, I mean like kitchen scraps…) goes in the compost pile.
-I raise animals for food. Yes, I kill them and eat them.
-The majority of the meat my family eats is supplied to us during deer season and lasts us for a year.
-On the day that solar panels become affordable, I will go off the grid.
That having been said:
-What I don’t want, is for Al Gore or Nancy Pelosi cramming their beliefs on the environment down my throat, asking me to drive a shoebox car while they are chauffered around in Suburbans. I don’t want them forcing me to recycle while they travel around in private jets.
This is an area dominated by politicians, Hollywood and the elite. I don’t see too many of them driving a Preiss (did I spell that right?).
Oh, and last week it snowed at my home in South Louisiana. I have seen that maybe 5 times in my entire life. But now apparently the Earth getting colder is also a sign of global warming.
 
BRZ said:
I Agree, I just think the problem is that people think there is no problem and so they continue to waste and pollute and damage the planet. There are so many animals going extinct, trees being cut down and right now I am in Asia, the air is terrible. I can tell you that every morning I wake up, my lungs are filled with phlegm because of the bad air here due to pollution.
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I heard an interesting way of framing some of these issues, as a cost analysis argument. In other words, what is the value of certain services that nature currently provides to us for “free”?

As an example, should the honey bee “give notice”, it would cost us billions upon billions (I believe the estimate was in the hundreds of billions but I can’t be sure if I remember that part accurately) to do the work that the honey bee does.

A rough estimate of replacing the services that nature provides is well over 17 trillion dollars. I heard this on a “Planet Earth” episode on Discovery.
 
RobertLGarrett said:
I agree and have said this a couple of times, but people who believe strongly in Global Warming feel the need to browbeat others who don’t…even if they agree on how we should treat the earth. Apparently, that is not enough. 😦
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Then it seems we should be putting aside the debate on whether global warming exists and debating on what we need to do in order to treat the earth in a way that dovetails with our religious obligations.

There are two perspectives (at least) for this. The micro and the macro. Micro being changes the individual can make to their daily lives and Macro being changes that require government intervention.

The micro while important will be woefully insufficient from both a scientific and a religious point of view. If we have a religious obligation to tend this garden, then such obligation can not allow us to ignore the larger issues simply by switching to cloth grocery bags and unplugging our computers when we are not using them.

We need cars that get 60mpg.
We need to replace at least 20% of our dirty electricity with clean electricity as quickly as possible.
To do this I think we need tax incentives in the green energy sector, paid for with tax increases to the dirty energy sector and/or dirty energy usage.
I think we need to build more nuclear power plants (they are generations ahead of 3 mile Island and Cherynoble reactors when it comes to safety).
Incandesant lightbulbs should be taken off the market and replaced by LED lights which are much more efficient than the high energy flourscents and do not contain mercury.

Utility companies should be encouraged through tax incentives into getting into the solar power business (i.e., leasing individual solar power units to residents for a nominal fee).

A moritorium should be placed on building any coal plants that are not built as clean burning plants and, again, tax incentives should be directed to encourage the necessary technology breakthroughs to make building clean burning coal plants feasible.

dual use construction should be encouraged, perhaps through tax incentives. Why not have a pizza delivery business rent the use of the local high school’s kitchen for example? Construction of new buildings puts its own stress on the enviornment.

Cities need to be designed or redesigned with an eye toward reducing the carbon footprint as much as possible. More bicycle friendly roads, better mass transport, more efficient use of telecommuting where appropriate, green rooftops, vertical farming, etc.
 
How Green is your parish?

By NCR Staff
Publication date:
August 8, 2008
Section:
A. Cover Story

We would like to hear from you if your parish is recycling, reducing waste, reusing or retrofitting. Or perhaps you have a parish environmental justice committee. Tell us about its latest project. Heard a good homily lately that mentions environmental concerns? Is your parish promoting community-supported agriculture subscriptions or fair-trade coffee? Have you done an energy audit of your buildings? Have you measured your parish’s carbon footprint? Is environmental education going on in the parish school?

We want to know about it. Submissions will be published in a future issue of NCR. Please limit them to 350 words or less. We reserve the right to edit them.

Send submissions to Rich Heffern at rheffern@ncronline.org or to Rich’s attention at: NCR, 115 E. Armour Blvd., Kansas City MO 64111.

National Catholic Reporter August 1, 2008
 
Valke2 said:
Then it seems we should be putting aside the debate on whether global warming exists and debating on what we need to do in order to treat the earth in a way that dovetails with our religious obligations.
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Indeed. However, I disagree in too much government intervention to accomplish the goals you want.

I am in the high tech industry and work with LED manufacturers, solar companies, and nano-technology companies. My customers and business partners are constantly innovating. When LEDs become cheaper, or at least close in cost, to incandescents, then incandescents will be replaced. It is not far off. When solar, and other technologies, become cost-effective, they will replace other energy sources. Nano-technology is also driving innovation in many areas - especially batteries, which are critical to the success of solar.

I agree with you on the need for more nuclear power. I think that is a place where public funding can help with loans for the power companies. The challenge is getting your fellow Global Warming enthusiasts who are anti-nuclear power to come on board.
 
The fact of the matter is that no matter what season, or year we are in, weather patterns will change. Whether or not it is man-made will continue to be debated. What can’t be debated, and is absolutely 100% correct, is that human beings simply haven’t shown any compassion to our planet.

This planet, this once beautiful planet, is being destroyed for the sake of profit and greed. I realize as populations grow, more people need to utilize more land and resources. This is a fact of life. But what we haven’t looked into, and what we should look into, is more efficient ways to utilize renewable resources. Air is free! So is solar energy! If scientists could come up with ways to harness these two energy sources, which are both seemingly infinite, and make them cheaper to use, then why not use them?

Why throw away recyclable goods or litter? To me it seems like a lot of people are purely lazy.
 
The Canticle of Creation - Saint Francis of Assisi (Feast, October 4)

Most high, all powerful, good Lord, to You be praise, glory and honor and all blessing.
To You alone, Most High, do they belong, and there is no man worthy to name You.
Praise be to You, my Lord, with all Your creatures.
Chief of all is Sir Brother Sun, who is our day; through whom You give light. Beautiful is he, radiant, with great splendor. He is a true revealer of You, Most High.
Praise be to You, my Lord, for Sister Moon and for the stars. In heaven You have formed them, bright, precious and fair.
Praise be to You, my Lord, for Brother Wind, and for the air, and for the cloud, for clear sky and for all weathers, by which You give nourishment to all Your creatures.
Praise be to You, my Lord, for Sister Water. She is most useful and humble, precious and pure.
Praise be to You, my Lord, for Brother Fire, by whom You light up the night. Fair is he and merry, mighty and strong.
Praise be to You, my Lord, for our Sister, Mother Earth, who sustains and keeps us. She brings forth divers fruits, the many-hued flowers and grass.
You, my Lord, for those who grant pardon for love of You, and bear weakness and buffetings. Blessed are they who live in peace, for by You, Most High, shall they be crowned.
Praise be to You, my Lord, for our Sister, Bodily Death, From whom no living man can flee. Woe to them who die in mortal sin! But blessed they who shall find themselves in Your most holy will; to them the second death shall do no ill.
 
RobertLGarrett said:
There is no reason for nastiness on this subject. Regardless of what you believe regarding “global warming” aka “climate change,” using solar panels at the Vatican is a good thing. We are called to be good stewards of the planet, and their purchase of solar panels does not hurt the economy.

This does not mean I will support carbon credits or any other such nonsensical political ideas, but I do try to do minimize pollution in any form. This is prudent even from a local environmental standpoint (e.g. smog).
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Agreed, and nicely stated. As is typical, the far left takes things to an unreasonable extreme, but their actions in no way diminish our responsibility to use what we have been given wisely and not deliberately waste or abuse resources just because we can. 👍
 
RobertLGarrett said:
I’m not so sure about that. Did you see the election results? Are you sure you want the US Bishops on your side? 😉
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And did you see the reporting after the elections? Raymond Arroyo reported in The World Over that perhaps as many as half our bishops voted for Obama. If that is true - and I’ll add that we’ll likely never know - then did the people really not listen to the bishops? What they said to me was that they could not present a clear and united front one way or the other, precisely because they could not define a key aspect of their teaching…namely, what constituted “proportionate reasoning” for not voting against an anti-life candidate? Perhaps once the bishops are able to clarify what proportionate reasoning is - they can present a more united front and then a voice that people would actually feel called to listen to.
 
Letchitsa1 said:
And did you see the reporting after the elections? Raymond Arroyo reported in The World Over that perhaps as many as half our bishops voted for Obama. If that is true - and I’ll add that we’ll likely never know - then did the people really not listen to the bishops? What they said to me was that they could not present a clear and united front one way or the other, precisely because they could not define a key aspect of their teaching…namely, what constituted “proportionate reasoning” for not voting against an anti-life candidate? Perhaps once the bishops are able to clarify what proportionate reasoning is - they can present a more united front and then a voice that people would actually feel called to listen to.
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The Bishops who were vocal spoke strongly in favor of the unborn. I didn’t hear much from the ones who voted for death. Apparently, they prefer to be quiet when voting against Church teaching.
 
RobertLGarrett said:
The Bishops who were vocal spoke strongly in favor of the unborn. I didn’t hear much from the ones who voted for death. Apparently, they prefer to be quiet when voting against Church teaching.
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And again - I know many folks who have made a good argument that voting for Obama was not necessarily contrary to Church teaching, providing they didn’t vote for him because of his pro-abortion stands. It all goes back to, 'What is proportionate reasoning?" a question our bishops cannot and apparently will not uniformly answer. We had the whole gambit this past election, from Archbishop Chaput saying “There is no proportionate reason” to the ones who were silent. And the one thing I noticed the vocal ones like Archbishop Chaput never addressed is, “What do you do when BOTH politicians are pro-death?” That may not have been the presidential candidates, but there were many more folks running for office than just Obama and McCain, and by failing to address that question, and in failing to define “proportionate reasons” all of our bishops - even the outspoken ones - were essentially derelict in their duties as our moral authorities.

That said, however, I am not going to rehash the elections further…it is not fair to the OP to hijack their thread for something that should be its own thread if it really needs to be debated some more.
 
Personally I find this whole “going green” stupidity to be nothing but another way for people to be “hip” and “trendy”. I simply refuse to engage in it.

:cool:
 
The pope said the created world was a great gift of God but is presently “exposed to serious risks by life choices and lifestyles that can degrade it.”
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“In particular, environmental degradation makes poor people’s existence intolerable,” he said.
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Full story: catholic.org/international/international_story.php?id=21044

That’s always been Pope Benedict’s cross - so hip and trendy that many people refuse to engage with what he says… 🤷
 
The priest at my university voted for Obama. I can’t prove that, but he was a vocal supporter of Obama and called McCain out of touch.
 
June 2, 2008
Senator ]
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20015
Dear Senator:
As the Senate takes up vital climate change legislation, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) wants to remind you that “the debate about how the United States is responding to questions and challenges surrounding global climate change is a test and an opportunity for our nation.”∗ The Catholic Bishops of the United States insist that “at its core, global climate change is not about economic theory or political platforms, nor about partisan advantage or interest group pressures. It is about the future of God’s creation and the one human family.”

more at

usccb.org/sdwp/ltr_senate_climate_change.pdf
I’ve always been about the environment.A lot of old stick in the mud’s have ridiculed me for this,calling it a bunch of new age hippy babble or whatever. Then it took Al Gore’s (not necessarily accurate but nonetheless compelling)
movie to shake them up a bit.
As a Catholic I feel it is our duty to be at the forefront of the movement.Especially since we are charged with being the Stewards of Gods Creation.Some how this gives me a somewhat irreverent sense of satisfaction knowing that the neo-pagans and new agers may get all shook up over the idea of a notoriously conservative crowd hijacking their cause.👍
 
Letchitsa1 said:
And again - I know many folks who have made a good argument that voting for Obama was not necessarily contrary to Church teaching, providing they didn’t vote for him because of his pro-abortion stands. It all goes back to, 'What is proportionate reasoning?" a question our bishops cannot and apparently will not uniformly answer. We had the whole gambit this past election, from Archbishop Chaput saying “There is no proportionate reason” to the ones who were silent. And the one thing I noticed the vocal ones like Archbishop Chaput never addressed is, “What do you do when BOTH politicians are pro-death?” That may not have been the presidential candidates, but there were many more folks running for office than just Obama and McCain, and by failing to address that question, and in failing to define “proportionate reasons” all of our bishops - even the outspoken ones - were essentially derelict in their duties as our moral authorities.

That said, however, I am not going to rehash the elections further…it is not fair to the OP to hijack their thread for something that should be its own thread if it really needs to be debated some more.
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I won’t rehash it either, since it is off-topic, but you need to do some research. Chaput and many bishops did, indeed, speak about what to do in those instances.
 
Weren’t Adam and Eve commanded to be the stewards of the earth? I think people have been shirking their duty for a long time, and now it’s coming back to haunt us…
 
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